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THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


SCENES    IN    ROMAN    LIFE,    PAINTED    BY   A    ROMAN    ARTIST. 
Made  up  from  paintings  which  decorated  the  walls  of  one  of  the  buried  houses  of  Pompeii.     The 
painter  has   endeavoured   to    make    every-day  subjects   more  interesting  by  depicting  the 
workers  as  little  cupids.     At  the  top  they  are  dyeing,  in  the  middle,  gathering  orchard  fruits, 
and  at  the  bottom,  forging,  casting,  and  working  in  metal. 


THE 


STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

A  Simple  History  for  Boys  and  Girls 


BY  ELIZABETH    O'NEILL,  M.A. 

rORMEBLY  UNIVBRSITr  FELLOW,  JONES  FELLOW,  AND  ASSISTANT 

LECTURER  IN  HISTORY  OF  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  MANCHESTER 

AUTHOR  OF   '  A  NURSERY  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND  ' 


PROFUSELY   ILLUSTRATED 

IN   COLOUR  AND   BLACK   AND  WHITE 

FROM    AUTHENTIC    SOURCES 


NEW   YORK 
G.    P.    PUTNAM'S    SONS 

LONDON:   T.  C.  &   E.   C.  JACK 


DEDICATORY  LETTER 

Dear  Doris, — You  were  kind  enough  to  read  a  small  part 
of  this  Story  of  the  World,  and  to  say  that  you  liked  it.  I 
hope  you  will  like  also  the  parts  you  did  not  read.  I  could 
not  tell  you  all  the  things  which  have  ever  happened  in  the 
world,  but  1  have  tried  to  tell  you  shortly  about  all  the  most 
important  things  from  the  very  beginning,  even  before  people 
had  come  into  the  World  at  all,  right  down  to  our  own 
wonderful  times.  I  have  chosen  the  greatest  men  and 
women  to  tell  you  about,  and  in  reading  their  stories  I  hope 
you  will  understand  better  something  of  what  the  times  were 
like  in  which  they  lived,  and  what  the  other  people  too  were 
like  who  were  not  so  great  and  the  kind  of  lives  they  led. 

The  pictures  in  the  book  are  not  like  those  in  most  of  the 
books  you  see  and  read,  because  most  of  them  are  not  pictures 
made  by  people  who  are  ahve  now,  but  they  are  copies  of 
pictures,  and  statues,  and  buildings  made  by  the  very  people 
you  are  reading  about  in  the  book.  When  you  are  reading 
about  the  Egyptians  you  get  a  picture  of  a  pyramid  made  by 
the  Egyptians  themselves  6000  years  ago.  When  you  read 
about  the  Greeks  you  find  pictures  of  statues  of  great  Greek 
statesmen  made  by  great  Greek  artists  long  ago,  and  so  on. 
In  the  *  Middle  Ages'  you  are  given  pictures  from  the 
beautiful  stained  glass  windows  and  the  wonderful  manu- 
scripts which  the  people  of  the  Middle  Ages  knew  so  well 
how  to  make.     Sometimes  the  drawing  may  seem  a  little 

a  2  V 


vi  THE   STORY  OF  THE   WORLD 

curious  to  you,  but  it  is  much  more  interesting  for  you  to 
have  these  pictures  than  imaginative  pictures  made  by  people 
who  are  Hving  now.^ 

Just  as  all  the  pictures  are  true  so  all  the  stories  are  true 
too.  Indeed,  there  were  many  tales  I  could  have  told  you 
which  are  often  told  to  children  as  history,  but  are  not  true 
at  all.  I  hope  you  will  like  those  I  have  told  just  as  well, 
for  after  all  history  should  be  true.  Very  affectionately  I 
dedicate  the  book  to  you. 

ELIZABETH  O'NEILL. 

^  All  the  illustrations  were  chosen  and  arranged  by  Mr.  S.  G.  Stubbs. 


CONTENTS 


I.  THE  COMING  OF  MAN 
II,  THE  JEWS  AND  THE  PH(ENICIANS 

III.  THE  GREEKS 

IV.  THE  ATHENS  OF  PERICLES  AND  SOCRATES 
V.  THE  GREEK  COLONIES  IN  THE  WEST    . 

VI.  THE  PELOPONNESIAN  WAR 

VIL  THE  LAST  DAYS  OF  GREEK  INDEPENDENCE 

VIII.  GREECE  AND  MACEDONIA . 

IX.  THE  RISE  OF  ROME  . 

X.  ROME  AND  THE  CELTS 

XI.  ROME  MISTRESS  OF  ITALY 

XII.  ROME  AND  CARTHAGE 

XIIL  ROME  AND  THE  EAST 

XIV,  LAST  DAYS  OF  THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC . 

XV.  EARLY  DAYS  OF  THE  ROMAN  EMPIRE . 

XVI,  THE  BARBARIANS  AND  THE  EMPIRE     . 

XVII.  THE  NEW  NATIONS  .... 

XVIII.  THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

XIX.  CHARLES  THE  GREAT  AND  THE  HOLY  ROMAN  EMPIRE 

XX.  THE  DAYS  OF  THE  NORTHMEN 

XXI.  THE  GREAT  POPE  HILDEBRAND 

XXII.  THE  CRUSADES 

XXIII.  THE    MONKS    AND   THE    PEOPLE    IN   THE   TIME    OF   THE 

CRUSADES  ....... 


PAGE 
1 

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69 

73 

85 

96 

102 

111 

123 

129 

152 

166 

179 

188 

195 

200 

209 

217 

229 


Vlll 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


CHAP. 

XXIV.  THE  THIRTEENTH  CENTURY    . 
XXV.  ST.  DOMINIC  AND  ST.  FRANCIS 
XXVI.  THE  BLACK  DEATH 
XXVII.  THE  END  OF  THE  MIDDLE  AGES 
XXVIII.  THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  MODERN  TIMES 
XXIX.  A  NEW  WORLD      . 
XXX.  CHRISTOPHER  COLUMBUS 
XXXI.  THE  REFORMATION 
XXXII.  THE  COUNTER-REFORMATION 

XXXIII.  ENGLAND  AND  SPAIN     . 

XXXIV.  THE  SEVENTEENTH  CENTURY 
XXXV.  THE  PILGRIM  FATHERS. 

XXXVI.  THE  AGE  OF  LOUIS  XIV. 
XXXVII.  THE  EAST  OF  EUROPE  IN  THE 
XXXVIII.  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY 
XXXIX.  THE  STORY  OF  INDIA     . 
XL.  THE  STORY  OF  CANADA 
XLI.  AMERICAN  INDEPENDENCE 
XLII.  AUSTRALASIA 
XLIII.  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION 
XLIV.  THE  STORY  OF  NAPOLEON 
XLV.  THE  REMAKING  OF  EUROPE 
XLVI.  AFRICA— THE  LAND  OF  MYSTERY 
XLVII.  THE  STORY  OF  CHINA  AND  JAPAN  . 
XLVIII.  OUR  WORLD  TO-DAY       . 

INDEX     


SEVENTEENTH  CENTURY 


LIST    OF    PLATES 

Scenes  in  Roman  life,  painted  by  a  Roman  artist,  .  .       Frontispiece 

AT    PAGE 

How  the  World  began,        ......  8 

How  an  Ancient  Egyptian  painted  the  coming  of  the  Israelites 

into  Egypt,  .  .  .  .  .  .  .          14 

The  Parthenon  and   the  Acropolis   of  Athens  as  they  probably 

were  in  the  days  of  Pericles,  .  .  .  .50 

The  Parthenon  of  Athens  as  it  is  to-day,    .  .  .  .50 

Alexander  the  Great,  the  World  Conqueror,  .  .  .  .80 

The  Roman  Forum  as  it  was,  looking  towards  the  Coliseum,  .        134 

The  Roman  Forum  as  it  is,  from  the  same  point  of  view,    .  .134 

Justinian  the  Great,  Emperor  and  Law-giver  of  Byzantium,  with 

his  Court,     .  .  .  .  .  .  .       1 82 

Scenes  in  the  life  of  Harold,  the  last  Saxon  King  of  England,  .  210 
A  Saracen  army  on  the  march  against  the  Crusaders,  .  .       226 

A  great  Gothic  building :  the  Cathedral  at  Rheims,  built  in  the 

thirteenth  and  fourteenth  centuries,  .  .  .       250 

Methods  of  warfare  during  the  Hundred  Years'  War,  .  .       272 

The  capture  of  Constantinople  in  1453  by  the  Turks  when  the 

last  Emperor  of  Byzantium  met  his  heroic  death,     .  .       294 

The  man  who  began  a  new  age  in  the  world's  history :  Christopher 

Columbus,  discoverer  of  America,     .  .  .  .310 

A  great  Church  of  the  Renaissance  :  St.  Peter's,  Rome,      .  .318 


X  THE   STORY   OF   THE   WORLD 

PAGE 

King  Henry  viii.  meeting  the  French  King  Francis  at  the  famous 

field  of  the  Cloth  of  Gold,    .  .  .  .  .324 

A  picture  of  London,  Westminster  and  the  Thames  in  1547,          .  330 

Queen  Elizabeth  with  the  Lords  and  Commons  in  Parliament,        .  352 

The  '  Sun'  King  Louis  xiv.  of  France,  with  his  brilliant  Court,       .  384 

The  great  Emperor  Akbar  enters  his  city  in  state, .  .  .  410 
The  rapid  growth  of  Canada — Winnipeg  (Fort  Garry)  fifty  years 

ago — Winnipeg  to-day,  .....  432 
The  proclamation  of  the  Commonwealth  of  Australia  at  Sydney  on 

January  1st,  1901,    .  .  .  .  .  .448 

The  solemn  coronation  of  the  Emperor  Napoleon  in  the  Cathedral 

of  Notre  Dame  at  Paris  in  1804,  ....  476 
Two  great  cities  of  old  and  new  Africa — modern  Cairo — Cape 

Town,           .......  520 

A  great  battle  in  Japanese  history,  painted  by  a  Japanese  artist,  .  528 


THE   STORY   OF  THE  WORLD 

CHAPTER   I 

THE  COMING  OF  MAN 

Long  before  men  came  into  the  world  the  earth  existed, 
though  it  was  very  different  from  the  earth  as  it  is  to-day. 
Men  of  science  who  can  read  a  story  in  the  rocks  which  make 
lip  the  surface  of  the  earth  tell  us  that  at  one  time  it  was 
so  hot  that  nothing  of  any  kind  could  li\'e  on  it.  It  was 
a  great  round  lump  of  melted  stuff  whirling  round  and  round. 
By  degrees  it  got  a  little  cooler.  The  outside  cooled  first,  and 
a  crust  was  formed  which  broke  and,  perhaps,  at  first  fell  into 
the  melted  part  underneath.  Later  on  it  stopped  falling 
through  and  turned  into  a  hard,  cool  skin,  much  like  the  earth 
as  it  is  now,  except  that  at  first  there  was  no  living  thing  on 
it,  not  even  the  smallest  flower  or  insect.  But  the  inside  of 
the  earth  has  not  cooled  altogether  yet,  and  we  find  that  if 
we  go  down  into  it,  for  instance  down  a  coal-mine,  it  grows 
hotter  the  lower  we  go.  Sixty  feet  below  the  surface  a 
thermometer  would  tell  us  that  it  is  a  degree  hotter,  another 
sixty  another  degree,  and  so  on. 

Still  the  outside  has  cooled,  and  when  it  had  become  cool 
enough  for  water  to  be  on  it  then  it  was  possible  for  plants 
and  animals  to  live.  Now  the  first  plants  and  animals  began 
to  live  so  long  ago  that  even  the  cleverest  men  cannot  say 
exactly  when  it  was.  It  must  have  been,  in  any  case, 
hundreds  and  hundreds  of  thousands  of  years  ago.  We  do 
not  know  even  when  the  first  man  lived,  and  we  do  not  know 
where.     In  the  Bible  we  are   told  that   the   first  man  was 

A 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


Adam,  and  that  he  lived  in  a  certain  place  which  had  four 
rivers  flowing  through  it.  Many  people  have  thought  that 
this  place,  the  Garden  of  Eden,  must  be  in  Arabia,  in  the 
valley  of  a  river  called  the  Euphrates,  where  the  Assyrians 
and  Babylonians  lived  afterwards.  But  some  of  the  greatest 
men  of  science  now  say  that  probably  the  first  man  lived  in 
an  island  in  the  far  East,  which  in  those  far-off  days  would 
not  be  an  island  at  all,  but  a  part  of  Southern  Asia.  One  of 
the  reasons  for  thinking  this  is  that  not  many  years  ago  a 
skull  was  found  there  which  is  thought  to  be  that  of  the  very 
first  man.  He  must  have  been  a  very  strange  man.  His 
forehead  sloped  back  sharply  from  his  eyebrows  instead  of 
going  straight  up  and  then  gently  back  as  ours  do.  His 
head  must  have  been  smaller  than  that  of  any  man  now  alive, 
but  it  was  larger  than  the  head  of  a  certain  kind  of  monkey 
called  the  '  Gibbon '  monkey,  though  it  was  very  much  like  it 
in  shape.  Learned  men  who  think,  as  many  of  them  do  now, 
that  men  are  descended  from   monkeys,   say  that  this  was 

probably  the  skull  of 
the  very  first  man, 
and  would,  there- 
fore, naturally  be 
very  much  like  that 
of  a  monkey. 

There  are  other 
reasons  why  men  of 
science  think  that  it 
was  in  Java  that  the 
first  man  was  born, 
and  one  of  them  is 
that  it  could  only  be 
in  a  warm,  moist 
climate  such  as  we  know  existed  there  that  man  could  first 
grow.  If  this  is  so,  of  course,  it  might  almost  as  well  be  in 
the  place  where  the  Garden  of  Eden  is  supposed  to  have 
been,  except  that  no  traces  of  these  far-off  men  have  been 


THE    SHAPE    OF    THE    FIRST    MAN's    HEAD 
(From  the  skull  found  in  Java  bj-  Dr.  Dubois). 


THE  COMING  OF  MAN  8 

found  there.  But  we  really  do  not  know  anything  certainly 
about  the  first  man,  though  we  know  a  good  deal  about 
men  who  lived  many  thousands  of  years  ago. 

There  are  some  signs  of  the  existence  of  the  first  men 
even  in  Europe  in  far-olF  ages,  when  the  land  was  covered 
with  white  glistening  ice,  and  everything  was  dreadfully  cold. 
We  do  not  know  how  these  men  came  to  Europe.  Nor  do 
we  know  how  many  kinds  of  men  there  were  at  the  time,  but 
traces  have  been  found  of  three  kinds  at  least.  We  shall 
hear  something  of  these  presently. 

Although  we  do  not  know  where  these  first  men  came 
from,  we  know  a  good  deal  about  them.  They  were  cave- 
dwellers.  They  did  not  build  houses  as  we  do ;  but  they 
moved  about  until  they  found  some  hole  in  the  rocks  which 
would  keep  out  the  cold  winds  and  the  hail  and  snow,  and 
there  they  made  their  home — if  they  could.  For  sometimes 
they  would  find  huge  animals  in  the  caves,  and  would  have 
to  fight  for  their  lives.  We  think  the  elephant  a  very  big 
animal,  but  the  elephants  of  those  days  were  much  bigger. 
The  elephants  of  to-day  would  look  beside  them  as  sheep 
beside  horses.  There  were  also  other  huge  animals  of 
different  kinds  with  strange  names  and  strange  shapes. 
Besides  these  there  were  giant  bears,  lions,  and  wolves. 

These  ancient  men  had  very  poor  weapons  to  fight  with. 
They  had  not  learned  to  make  swords  and  spears  of  iron. 
Stone  was  all  they  could  think  of  to  make  their  axes,  spears, 
knives,  and  swords.  They  would  knock  one  piece  of  stone 
against  another  until  they  had  made  a  sharp  edge,  and  then 
after  a  long  time  it  would  look  something  like  the  head  of  an 
axe.  A  favourite  place  for  caves  chosen  as  homes  by  these 
wild  men  was  the  side  of  a  steep  cliff,  or  hill,  probably  because 
the  great  wild  animals  could  not  reach  them  there  very  easily. 
We  know  of  several  of  these  caves  w^hich,  because  of  the  things 
dug  out  of  them,  must  have  been  the  homes  of  wild,  early  men 
like  these. 

They  stained  themselves  different  colours  with  the  juice  of 


4  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

plants,  just  as  the  people  did  whom  Julius  Caesar  found  in 
Britain.  They  wore  skins  of  wild  animals  for  clothes,  and 
they  lived  on  the  flesh  of  the  animals  they  killed  and  on 
roots  which  they  dug  out  of  the  earth.  We  find  not  only 
their  rough  stone  weapons,  but  their  bones  lying  side  by  side 
with  those  of  the  great  rhinoceros,  which  they  seem  to  have 
learned  how  to  kill  easily.  They  knew  how  to  make  fires,  and 
they  kept  the  wild  beasts  away  at  night  by  building  up  great 
fires  made  from  the  brushwood  of  the  forests. 

These  men  were  not  attractive  to  look  at.  Their  fore- 
heads went  sharply  back  from  their  eyebrows,  and  these  stood 
out  like  a  shield  over  their  eyes.  Their  chins  also  went  back 
from  their  teeth  instead  of  forward  like  ours.  They  were 
short  men,  and  as  we  have  seen  did  not  know  many  things  as 
yet.  They  must  have  been  very  cunning  hunters,  as  that  was 
the  work  they  lived  by,  and  some  of  their  weapons  were 
cleverly  made.  But  at  best  they  were  not  very  different 
from  monkeys. 

These  ancient  men  are  called  by  some  people  '  Neander ' 
men,  because  the  first  head  of  such  a  man  was  found  in  a  cave 
in  Germany  called  the  Neander  cave. 

The  Reindeer  Men 

Long  after  the  Neander  men  lived  we  know  that  there  was 
another  sort  of  ancient  men  who  are  called  'Cromagnard'  men, 
because  their  skulls  were  first  found  at  Cromagnan  in  France. 
They  are  also  sometimes  called  Reindeer  men,  because  they 
lived  at  the  time  when  reindeer  roamed  over  the  south  of 
Europe.  Now  these  Reindeer  men,  although,  of  course,  they 
were  savage  men  who  lived  thousands  and  thousands  of  years 
ago,  must  have  been  in  some  ways  almost  like  the  men  of 
to-day.  The  climate  had  changed  very  much  from  that 
which  the  Neander  men  had  had  to  put  up  with.  It  was 
now  cold  and  dry.  The  ice  had  disappeared,  and  the  climate 
was  not  very  different  from  that  in  the  north  of  Europe  in 
winter  now. 


THE  COMING  OF  MAN  5 

The  Reindeer  men  were  still  cave-dwellers,  and  some  of 
their  traces  have  been  found  in  caves  in  Devon  and  Derby- 
shire, But  they  had  foreheads  like  those  of  men  now,  rising 
fairly  gently  from  the  eyebrows.  The  whole  head  and  face 
of  a  Reindeer  man  must  have  been  quite  like  those  of  men 
we  meet  every  day.  The  size  of  his  head  was  about  the  same. 
The  only  great  difference  was  that  the  chin  still  went  back- 
wards from  the  teeth.  They  were  tall  men,  too,  with  much 
better  figures  than  the  Neander  men.  But  this  is  not  all. 
Though  they  were  hunters,  and  had  only  weapons  of  stone, 
their  weapons  were  more  finely  made,  and,  strange  to  say,  the 
Reindeer  men  were  very  fine  artists.  Curious,  savage  people 
though  they  were,  covering  their  bodies  with  yellow  and  red 
paint,  they  could  cut  into  ivory  perfect  little  pictures  of  the 
things  they  saw  around  them.  You  can  almost  see  the  deer 
putting  down  its  finely  shaped  legs  when  you  look  at  some  of 
these  scenes  in  ivory.  They  could  paint  too.  In  a  cave  in 
the  north  of  Spain  there  are  painted  on  the  walls  in  almost 
natural  colours  and  in  natural  positions,  buffaloes,  wild  boars, 
and  horses.  They  were  painted  long  ago  by  the  Reindeer 
men.  Sometimes  they  tried  sculpture,  and  at  this  too  they 
were  very  clever. 

These  paintings  and  sculptures  and  drawings  are  to  be 
found  not  in  one  cave  only,  but  in  many  in  the  south  of 
France  and  in  the  north  of  Spain,  so  we  cannot  think  they 
were  the  work  of  one  artist  among  a  number  of  savages,  just 
like  a  genius  among  thousands  of  ordinary  people  to-day.  They 
were  a  real  race  of  artists,  clever  men  in  many  ways  though  so 
savage  in  others.  We  know  that  they  were  clever  in  other 
ways  too.  They  got  their  flints  and  stones  to  make  weapons 
from  mines  from  which  they  dug  them  with  axes  sometimes 
made  out  of  the  horns  of  animals.  We  know,  too,  that  they 
made  lamps  for  themselves.  Altogether,  they  must  have  been 
men  whom  we  should  have  liked  to  know. 

A  strange  thing  about  these  Reindeer  men  is  that  we  are 
almost  certain  that  they  were  not  descended  from  the  rougher 


6  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

and  ruder  Neander  men.  It  seems  more  probable  that  they 
came  to  the  western  parts  of  Europe  when  the  terrible 
covering  of  ice  had  gone  from  it.     But  a  still  stranger  thing 


SPECIMENS    OF    THE    WORK    OF    THE    MOST    ANCIENT    OF    THE    WORLD  S    ARTISTS 

(1)  A  buffalo  painted  on  a  wall  of  a  cave  at  Altamira,  North  Spain,  perhaps  50,000  years  ago; 

(2)  Carvings  on  ivory  by  Reindeer  men  ;  (3)  A  tool  carved  out  of  flint  found  at  a  great  camp  of 
the  New  Stone  Age  in  Sussex;  (4)  and  (5)  Beautifully  carved  flint  arrow-heads  of  the  same  Age 
found  in  Ireland ;  (6)  A  flint  pick  found  in  the  Thames ;  (7)  A  flint  knife  from  Denmark. 

is  that  the  bodies  of  another  kind  of  men  still  have  been  found, 
of  the  same  sort  as  the  negro  of  the  present  time.  So  here 
we  see  there  are  three  kinds  of  men  found  living  at  the  same 


THE  COMING  OF  MAN  7 

time ;  the  savage  small  Neander  men,  the  artistic  and  clever 
and  finely  built  Reindeer  men,  and  the  Negro  men.  But  we 
know  almost  nothing  about  the  Negro  men.  All  these  men 
lived  in  a  time  which  the  people  who  study  these  things  call 
the  'Old  Stone  Age.'  But  the  Reindeer  men  still  lived  in 
the  New  Stone  Age — a  time  which  is  nearer  to  the  days  when 
real  history  begins. 

The  weather  in  the  west  of  Europe  was  growing  warmer 
still,  so  that  new  and  different  kinds  of  animals  could  live 
there.  The  reindeer  had  gone,  but  there  was  now  the  red 
deer  which  long  afterwards  the  Red  King  loved  to  hunt  in 
England. 

The  Lake- Dwellers 

The  Reindeer  men  disappeared  with  the  reindeer.  Where 
they  went  to  we  do  not  know.  Perhaps  they  just  died  out 
because  the  weather  did  not  suit  them  as  it  did  other  men 
who  now  began  to  show  themselves.  So  far  as  we  know  the 
new  people  did  not  come  from  the  Reindeer  men.  The  men 
of  this  new  time  began  to  build  houses,  sometimes  of  stone, 
sometimes  of  wood.  A  favourite  place  for  houses  was  the 
middle  of  lakes.  The  men  first  drove  heavy  pieces  of  wood 
into  the  water,  and  then  built  their  houses  upon  them.  Lake- 
dwellers,  as  we  call  them,  are  known  to  have  lived  at  Glaston- 
bury in  England.  They  began  to  collect  herds  of  cattle  and 
kept  them  for  food.  They  also  tilled  the  land  and  grew  things. 
They  built  strange  circles  of  stone,  one  of  which  may  still  be 
seen  at  Stonehenge  in  the  South  of  England.  We  know,  too, 
that  they  began  to  make  pottery,  but  they  could  not  draw 
and  paint  like  the  Reindeer  men  who  had  lived  perhaps 
thousands  of  years  before  them.  This  seems  a  strange  thing, 
as  the  new  men  were  so  much  more  civilized  in  other  ways. 
The  New  Stone  Age  reaches  the  time  of  which  real  history 
begins  to  speak.  It  lasted,  until  about  four  thousand  years 
ago  in  some  parts  of  Europe,  but  in  Egypt  even  about  seven 
thousand  years  ago  the  people  had  learned  to  make  weapons 


8  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

of  bronze,  and  a  little  later  of  iron.  It  is  with  these  people 
that  the  most  interesting  part  of  the  story  of  the  world 
commences.  Of  the  earlier  peoples  we  can  never  know  very 
much,  and  real  history  begins  with  the  writing  down  of  the 
doings  of  men  who  were  very  different  from  these  savages — 
people  who  knew  many  things  and  wanted  to  know  more,  and 
so  people  whom  we  understand  better  and  like  to  hear  about. 

When  people  learned  to  make  weapons  of  bronze  and  iron 
instead  of  stone  the  wild  animals  were  more  frightened  of 
them,  and  fled  before  them.  When  all  the  animals  in  one 
place  had  been  killed  or  had  run  away  the  people  moved  on 
to  another  place  to  find  more  animals ;  so  that  in  the  very 
early  days  people  were  always  moving  from  place  to  place. 
Families  who  were  related  to  each  other  kept  together  and 
moved  with  each  other.  We  call  a  number  of  families 
keeping  together  in  this  way  a  'tribe.'  Often  two  tribes 
would  want  to  go  to  the  same  place,  and  then  they  would 
fight,  and  the  tribe  which  won  would  have  the  land. 

After  many  years  men  began  to  collect  together  sheep  and 
cows,  from  which  they  got  nearly  everything  they  wanted. 
They  killed  some  of  them  for  meat  to  eat,  and  got  milk  from 
the  cows  to  drink,  and  they  made  themselves  clothes  from 
the  wool  of  the  sheep.  When  there  were  so  many  animals 
the  grass  was  soon  eaten  up,  and  so  again  the  tribes  had  to 
move  on  to  other  places  for  fresh  pasture  land. 

Sometimes  when  a  tribe  found  land  on  which  things  grew 
very  easily  they  stayed  there,  and  instead  of  keeping  so  many 
sheep  and  cattle  they  kept  only  a  few,  and  instead  of  letting 
grass  grow  all  over  the  land  they  gave  up  some  of  the  land  to 
grow  many  other  things.  They  built  themselves  houses  to 
live  and  sleep  in  instead  of  the  tents  which  they  had  used 
when  they  were  always  moving.  So  villages  were  made,  and 
some  of  these  grew  into  towns,  and  instead  of  all  the  men 
hunting  or  fishing  or  fighting  or  growing  corn  some  began  to 
do  one  thing  and  some  another.  Some  men  made  boots,  and 
others  made  weapons  for  the  people  who  were  looking  after 


HOW  THE  WORLD  BEGAN. 
The  world  probably  began  as  a  great  mass  of  glowing  gas  whirling  round  and  round,  which  gradu- 
ally, after  miUions  of  years,  cooled  down  into  solid  matter.  This  photograph  (taken  through 
the  great  telescope  of  Yerkes  Observatory)  shows  the  mass  of  glowing  gas  in  the  Milky  Way 
called  the  nebula  of  Andromeda,  which  is  now  in  the  state  that  our  world  was  probably  in  at 
the  beginning. 


THE  COMING  OF  MAN  9 

the  land  and  had  no  time  to  do  these  things  for  themselves. 
But  always  for  thousands  of  years  there  were  tribes  still 
moving,  sometimes  coming  to  fight  the  people  who  had 
settled  down,  and  taking  their  lands  from  them.  Most  of  the 
people  in  the  hottest  part  of  the  earth  had  black  skins  and 
black  hair.  Those  farther  north  were  brown  or  yellowy  and 
also  had  black  or  very  dark  hair.  Then  there  were  tribe  upon 
tribe  of  white  people,  and  more  and  more  of  these  were  ever 
pouring  into  Europe  from  Asia.  We  know  most  about  the 
people  of  Europe,  Asia,  and  the  north  of  Africa,  and  more 
about  some  of  these  peoples  than  about  others.  With  the 
story  of  the  people  who  lived  on  the  banks  of  two  great  rivers 
the  Nile  and  the  Euphrates,  real  history  begins. 


CHAPTER   II 

THE  JEWS  AND  THE  PHOENICIANS 

The  rich  lands  on  which  things  grew  easily  and  where  men 
first  settled  down  to  live  without  moving  away  were  generally 
found  on  the  banks  of  great  rivers.  People  cannot  live 
without  water  to  drink,  and  the  soil,  too,  must  be  watered 
before  it  will  bear  fruit.  For  thousands  of  years,  while  tribes 
were  still  swarming  over  Asia  and  passing  into  Europe, 
lasting  settlements  had  existed  near  two  great  rivers,  the 
river  Nile  in  North  Africa  and  the  river  Euphrates  in  Western 
Asia.  The  country  round  the  banks  of  the  Nile  was  called 
Egypt.  The  Egyptians  were  a  brown  people,  with  straight 
black  hair  and  curious  long  dark  eyes.  The  country  on  the 
right  of  the  Euphrates  was  called  Mesopotamia ;  the  people 
there  belonged  to  the  lighter  races. 

In  both  these  countries  as  the  years  went  on  the  people 
had  learnt  to  do  many  wonderful  things  which  would  have 
been  impossible  in  earlier  and  wilder  times.  They  learned  to 
know  something  about  the  sun  and  stars  ;  they  could  count 
and  do  sums  in  arithmetic,  and  they  learned  to  build  not  only 
houses  of  brick,  but  great  buildings  of  stone,  and  though  they 
did  not  write  as  we  do,  and  had  not  paper  and  ink,  they  had 
a  picture-writing  of  their  own  which  they  scratched  on  stones 
and  the  walls  of  their  buildings.  Many  of  these  pictures 
remain  to  this  day,  and  clever  men  are  able  to  read  them  and 
tell  us  what  they  mean.  In  Egypt  the  most  wonderful  build- 
ings of  all  were  great,  pointed  stone  monuments,  which  the 
old  Egyptians  built  over  the  graves  of  their  dead  kings  to  do 
them  honour,  lest  they  should  be  forgotten.  These  Pyramids 
were  built  nearly  four  thousand  years  before  the  Birth  of  Christ; 


THE  JEWS  AND  THE  PHOENICIANS 


11 


and  there  they  stand  to  this  day,  and  people  go.  from  far-off 
countries  to  look  at  them  as  one  of  the  wonders  of  the 
world.  They  are  so  big  and  wonderful  that  the  people  of 
to-day  cannot  imagine  how  they  were  built.  The  Egyptians, 
too,  made  beautiful  stone  statues,  and  they  must  have  been 
very  fond  of  beautiful  things.  But  we  must  remember  that 
not  all  the  people  could  enjoy  these  things,  for  many  of  them 
were  slaves  and  had  to  do  all  the  work,  and  could  be  bought 


THE    PYRAMID    TOMB    OF    KING    KHUFU    AND    THE    GREAT    SPHINX   AT    GIZEHj    EGYPT 

This  is  the  greatest  of  the  Pyramids.     It  was  built  over  6500  years  ago,  and  is  150  feet 
higher  than  St.  Paul's  Cathedral. 


and  sold  like  animals.  It  must  have  kept  thousands  and 
thousands  of  slaves  busy  cutting  the  great  stones  to  build 
the  Pyramids. 

More  than  a  thousand  years  after  the  Pyramids  were  built, 
the  Egyptians  were  conquered  by  a  new  people  who  came 
out  of  Arabia.  These  were  a  Semitic  people,  quite  different 
from  the  Egyptians;  it  is  to  this  race  that  the  Jews  and  Arabs 
belong.  All  the  Semitic  peoples  seem  to  have  come  from 
Arabia  at  first.     After  about  two  hundred  years  the  Semites 


12  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

were  driven  out  of  Egypt.  But  long  before  these  Semites 
went  into  Egypt  others  had  crossed  the  country  called  Syria 
and  conquered  Mesopotamia.  They  found  there  a  people 
much  more  civilized  than  themselves ;  but  they  soon  became 
as  civilized  as  the  people  round  them,  and  set  up  great 
kingdoms. 

The  south-eastern  part  of  Mesopotamia  was  called 
Babylon,  and  a  great  Semitic  kingdom  was  founded  there. 
One  of  its  rulers,  called  Hammurabi,  drew  up  some  famous 
laws,  which  he  had  written  down  on  a  great  block  of  stone, 
on  which  clever  men  to-day  can  read  the  laws  of  the 
Babylonians  two  thousand  years  before  the  Birth  of  Christ. 
These  laws  show  that  the  Babylonians  were  very  highly 
civilized  indeed. 

The  part  of  Mesopotamia  to  the  north-west  of  Babylonia 
was  called  Assyria,  and  was  nearly  always  under  the  same 
ruler  as  Babylonia.  The  old  writers  used  to  call  them  both 
by  the  one  name,  '  Assyria,'  but  it  was  generally  the 
Babylonians  who  were  the  more  important  people. 

Clever  men  who  are  interested  in  the  story  of  these  old 
peoples  have  dug  deep  down  in  the  ground  at  different 
places  in  these  countries,  which  are  now  very  lonely  and 
wild.  They  have  found  there  old  forgotten  temples  and 
walls  and  tombs,  and  all  sorts  of  vases  and  weapons,  be- 
longing to  different  times  in  the  several  thousands  of  years 
during  which  the  greatness  and  civilization  of  the  Assyrians 
and  Babylonians  lasted. 

In  the  British  Museum  we  can  see  the  great  bronze  gates 
of  a  palace  built  nearly  a  thousand  years  before  the  Birth 
of  Christ.  They  are  covered  with  curious  and  beautiful 
sculpture.  But  many  older  things  than  these  have  been 
found,  and  some  have  been  carried  away  to  different  countries 
of  Europe. 

It  was  in  the  time  of  Hammurabi  that  Abraham,  of 
whom  we  read  so  much  in  the  Bible,  lived.  Up  to  this 
time  the  people  of  Egypt  and  Mesopotamia,  though  they  knew 


THE  JEWS  AND  THE  PHOENICIANS  13 

so  many  things,  knew  very  little  about  each  other  and  the 
rest  of  the  world. 

Abraham 

At  last,  one  man  travelled  from  beyond  the  Euphrates, 
right  across  the  land  of  Canaan,  which  we  now  call  Syria, 
and  into  Egypt.  This  was  Abraham,  the  father  of  the 
Hebrew  or  Jewish  people,  who  were  to  have  such  a  wonder- 
ful history.  Abraham  was  a  very  rich,  wise  man,  the 
father  of  an  immense  family.  He  was  a  Semite  who  lived 
in  the  land  of  Mesopotamia,  but  he  heard  the  Voice  of  God 
telling  him  to  go  out  from  his  home,  to  leave  his  father  and 
friends,  and  to  go  to  the  land  that  should  be  shown  to  him. 
In  those  days  people  worshipped  many  gods,  but  Abraham 
believed  in  the  one  God,  and  he  handed  on  his  belief  to  the 
people  whose  father  he  was.  It  was  from  the  Jews  that  after 
hundreds  of  years  nearly  all  the  world  learned  to  worship  the 
one  God. 

Abraham  travelled  out  of  Mesopotamia  into  the  land  of 
Canaan.  He  was  a  rich  man  and  the  head  of  a  tribe  of  about 
twelve  hundred  people,  besides  the  family  and  followers  of 
his  nephew  Lot  who  travelled  with  him.  Abraham  was  head 
of  all  and  led  the  rest.  He  went  on  before  dressed  in  a  bright 
scarlet  robe.  His  wife  and  children  probably  rode  on  donkeys 
or  camels.  There  were  many  of  these,  and  on  their  backs 
the  men-servants  and  maid-servants  piled  Abraham's  great 
possessions — his  clothing  and  that  of  his  family,  the  tents 
in  which  they  slept,  food  and  the  things  with  which  to 
cook  it,  and  what  hangings  and  coverings  were  used.  Other 
slaves  drove  the  great  herds  of  sheep  and  cattle  belonging  to 
Abraham  and  Lot.  It  was  Abraham  who  said  where  they 
should  travel  and  where  they  should  stop.  Generally  they 
were  moving  up  and  down  amidst  the  rich  pasture  lands 
and  the  beautiful  groves  of  oak  in  the  land  of  Canaan, 
which  God  had  promised  should  belong  to  him  and  to  his 
children's    children    for    ever.       Generally,    too,    Abraham 


14  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

and  his  people  travelled  under  a  cloudless  sky  of  blue,  and 
all  must  have  been  gay  and  happy.  But  there  was  a  dark 
side  to  this  free  and  happy  life.  Sometimes  no  rain  would 
fall  for  many  days,  and  the  grass  would  dry  up  under  the 
blazing  sun,  and  there  was  no  water  for  man  or  beast  to 
drink.  Corn  would  not  grow,  and  there  was  little  or  no- 
thing to  eat.     It  was  the  dead  time  of  famine. 

At  one  time  when  famine  fell  thus  upon  the  land  Abraham 
led  his  people  further  and  further  south  into  the  rich  land 
of  Egypt,  where  they  could  have  water  and  bread.  Here 
Abraham  saw  for  the  first  time  the  wonderful  land  of  the 
pyramids  with  its  temples  and  its  statues.  It  was  even  hotter 
in  Egypt  than  in  the  land  of  Canaan.  Half  the  year  it  had 
soft  spring  weather,  and  for  the  other  half  a  scorching  summer. 
But  it  was  a  rich  land  and  generally  had  much  corn.  The 
great  river  Nile  which  runs  through  the  land,  and  which  the 
Egyptians  worshipped  as  a  god,  overflowed  its  banks  each 
year,  and  the  water  spread  over  the  low  lands,  fertilizing  the 
crops.  Having  done  its  work,  the  river  shrank  again  to  its 
ordinary  size.  Sometimes  the  Nile  did  not  rise,  and  then 
the  people  were  sad  for  nothing  would  grow ;  but  there  was 
so  much  corn  in  the  years  of  plenty  that  it  could  be  stored 
up  to  feed  the  people  in  the  days  of  famine.  It  was  at  a  time 
of  famine  in  the  land  of  Canaan  that  Abraham  led  his  people 
into  Egypt,  where  there  was  corn  for  all. 

The  Pharaoh  or  Egyptian  king  welcomed  him  and  gave  him 
corn  and  rich  presents,  and  Abraham  taught  the  Egyptians 
things  about  the  stars  which  he  had  learnt  in  Mesopotamia 
and  which  the  Egyptians  did  not  know.  When  the  famine 
was  over  Abraham  went  again  out  of  Egypt  into  the  beautiful 
land  of  Canaan.  But  he  had  now  so  many  people  that  his 
servants  and  those  of  his  nephew,  Lot,  quarrelled  about  the 
pasture  lands,  and  Abraham  thought  it  best  that  they  should 
separate.  He  took  his  nephew  to  the  top  of  a  hill  where  they 
could  look  down  upon  all  the  land  of  Canaan,  and  told  him 
to  choose  which  part  he  would  take  for  himself.     Lot  chose 


HOW    AN    ANCIKNT    EGYPTIAN    PAINTED    THE    COMING    OF    THE 
ISRAELITES    INTO    EGYPT. 
From  a  painting  on  the  walls  of  a  tomb  at  Beni  Hassan,  Egypt,  made  nearly  4000  years  ago.     It  may 
very  easily  represent  Israelites  as  the  Egyptians  saw  them  when  Abraham  went  with  bis  people 
into  Egypt  in  the  time  of  famine. 


THE  JEWS  AND  THE  PHCENICIANS  15 

the  rich  country  that  lay  round  the  banks  of  the  river  Jordan, 
and  Abraham  was  content  with  another  part  of  Canaan. 

There  were  other  tribes  besides  those  of  Abraham  and  Lot 
in  the  land  of  Canaan,  and  when  one  of  these,  called  the  Ela- 
mites,  fought  against  Lot  and  carried  him  and  his  people  off 
as  prisoners,  Abraham  went  to  their  rescue  and  brought  them 
safely  back.  It  was  on  his  way  back  from  this  expedition 
that  Abraham  met  Melchisedech,  who  was  a  priest  and  also 
ruler  of  one  of  the  many  cities  which  were  spread  about  the 
land  of  Canaan.  Melchisedech  also  worshipped  the  one  God, 
and  offered  to  Him  a  sacrifice  of  bread  and  wine,  instead  of 
animals  or  fruits  which  were  the  common  sacrifices  of  the  time. 
Melchisedech  felt  himself  drawn  to  love  Abraham,  and  offered 
him  the  tenth  part  of  all  he  possessed,  but  Abraham  would 
take  nothing  for  himself  or  his  own  people,  but  only  for  the 
men  who  had  joined  their  servants  to  his  in  the  battle. 

When  Abraham  had  gone  back  to  his  home  it  was  revealed 
to  him  that  he  should  become  the  father  of  a  great  nation, 
to  which  the  land  of  Canaan  should  belong  in  the  end,  though 
it  must  suffer  much,  and  be  carried  into  captivity  after  his 
death.  Now  Sarah,  the  wife  of  Abraham,  had  not  any  children. 
She  was  already  ninety  years  old  (for  people  lived  to  a  great 
age  in  those  days),  and  Abraham  wondered  how  his  children's 
children  could  become  as  many  as  the  stars  in  heaven  if  he 
had  not  even  one  child.  But  Sarah  had  a  son  as  had  been 
promised,  and  they  called  him  Isaac.  Sarah  lived  to  see  her 
boy  grow  to  be  a  man,  and  was  buried  at  the  age  of  one  hundred 
and  twenty-seven  years  in  the  cave  of  Hebron,  which  Abraham 
bought  to  be  a  burying-place  for  himself  and  his  family. 
Through  Isaac,  Abraham  was  the  father  of  the  Jews,  but  he 
had  other  children  with  other  mothers,  and  through  these  he 
became  the  father  of  other  nations.  His  son  Ishmael,  whose 
mother  was  Sarah's  handmaiden  Hagar,  was  the  first  of  an 
Arab  tribe,  and  six  sons  of  Abraham  by  a  second  wife  founded 
other  tribes.  These  families  went  out  from  the  land  of 
Canaan,  leaving  it  to  Isaac,  the  son  of  Sarah. 


THE  JEWS  AND  THE  PHCENICIANS  17 

When  Isaac  had  grown  to  be  a  man,  Abraham  sent  a 
servant  to  seek  a  wife  for  him  in  his  old  home  in  Mesopotamia. 
Men  now  travelled  much  oftener  between  Mesopotamia  and 
Egypt  across  the  land  of  Canaan.  The  servant  prayed  that 
he  might  have  a  sign  to  show  him  how  to  choose  a  wife  for  his 
master's  son.  He  asked  that  the  maid  who  was  the  one  to 
choose  should  give  him  water  to  drink  when  he  asked  her, 
and  offer  to  draw  some  from  the  well  for  his  camels  too. 

One  evening,  when  he  had  made  his  camels  lie  down  near 
a  well  outside  a  town,  he  saw  a  beautiful  girl  coming  to  the 
well  with  a  pitcher  on  her  shoulder  to  draw  water.  He 
asked  her  to  give  him  water  to  drink,  and  she  immediately 
filled  the  pitcher  and  gave  it  to  him  and  then  drew  more  for 
the  camels.  The  servant  knew  then  that  she  was  the  wife 
whom  he  was  seeking  for  Isaac.  He  went  back  with  her  to 
her  brother's  house  and,  bringing  forth  precious  gifts  of  silver 
and  gold,  he  asked  that  Rebecca  might  go  back  with  him  to 
be  Isaac's  wife.     And  so  she  did. 


Esau  and  Jacob 

Isaac  and  Rebecca  loved  each  other  at  first  sight.  They 
had  two  sons,  Esau  and  Jacob.  Esau  grew  up  to  be  a  strong 
man.  His  skin  was  covered  with  hairs,  and  he  loved  hunting. 
He  was  his  father's  favourite,  but  Rebecca  loved  Jacob  best. 
One  day,  when  Esau  came  in  tired  and  very  hungry  from 
hunting,  he  found  Jacob  cooking  some  food  for  himself  and 
he  begged  him  to  give  it  to  him.  Jacob  said  he  would  if 
Esau  would  promise  to  give  up  to  him  his  rights  as  eldest 
son.  So  Esau  sold  his  birthright  for  a  mess  of  pottage,  and 
Jacob,  though  he  was  the  younger  son,  became  the  head  of  the 
children  of  Abraham.  Jacob,  by  covering  himself  with  the 
skins  of  kids,  pretended  to  his  father  Isaac  that  he  was  Esau, 
and  Isaac  gave  him  his  solemn  blessing. 

Then  Jacob  went  away  to  the  land  of  Mesopotamia  to 
find    a  wife.      He  loved    Rachel,  the   younger  daughter  of 

B 


18  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

his  uncle  Laban,  and  Laban  promised  her  to  him  as  his 
wife  if  he  would  work  for  him  for  seven  years.  Jacob  did 
this,  but  Laban  then  said  he  would  give  him  his  elder 
daughter  Lia  and  he  must  serve  seven  years  more  for  Rachel. 
In  those  days  men  could  have  several  wives.  At  the  end  of 
another  seven  years  Jacob  won  Rachel,  and  he  always  loved 
her  best.  Lia  had  six  sons  and  Rachel  only  two,  Joseph 
and  Benjamin,  and  these  two  Jacob  loved  best  for  their 
mother's  sake.  After  the  birth  of  Joseph,  Jacob  took  his 
wives  and  children  and  all  his  possessions  and  went  back 
again  into  the  land  of  Canaan.  Here  his  sons  grew  up,  and 
Jacob  always  loved  Joseph  best.  He  loved  to  dress  him  in 
beautiful  clothes,  and  he  gave  him  a  wonderful  coat  made  of 
different  coloured  stuffs. 

Joseph  had  eleven  brothers  altogether.  Some  of  them 
were  jealous  of  Joseph  and  wanted  to  kill  him.  One  day, 
when  they  were  far  away  from  home  looking  after  their 
father's  sheep,  Jacob  sent  Joseph  with  a  message  to  them, 
but  they  took  his  beautiful  coat  from  him  and  sold  him  to 
some  merchants  who  were  travelling  into  the  land  of  Egypt. 
Then  they  dipped  his  coat  in  the  blood  of  a  kid  which  they 
had  killed  and  sent  it  to  their  father.  Jacob  was  broken- 
hearted, for  he  thought  that  a  wild  beast  had  killed  and  eaten 
Joseph,  and  that  it  was  his  blood  which  stained  the  coat. 

But  Joseph  was  sold  in  Egypt  and  became  a  servant  to 
Potiphar,  a  captain  in  the  palace  of  the  Pharaoh.  The 
Pharaoh  at  this  time  was  probably  one  of  the  Semitic  con- 
querors of  Egypt,  and  so  was  friendly  towards  other  Semites. 
Joseph  had  many  strange  adventures  in  Egypt.  At  one 
time  he  was  shut  up  in  prison  through  the  wickedness  of 
Potiphar's  wife,  who  told  her  husband  that  Joseph  had  done 
wrong  things  which  he  had  never  done.  While  he  was  in 
prison  he  was  able  to  tell  some  of  the  other  prisoners  the 
meaning  of  some  strange  dreams  they  had  had.  Then  the 
Pharaoh  had  a  dream  which  troubled  him,  and  which  none 
of  the  wise  men  in  Egypt  could  explain  to  him.     Pharaoh 


THE  JEWS  AND  THE  PHCENICIANS  19 

was  told  of  this  servant  in  prison  who  could  tell  the  meaning 
of  dreams.  So  Joseph  was  sent  for  to  go  before  the  Pharaoh 
and  hear  the  dreams. 


Joseph  in  Egypt 

The  Pharaoh  had  dreamed  that  he  stood  upon  the  bank 
of  a  river,  and  out  of  the  river  came  seven  beautiful  fat 
cows  and  began  to  feed  on  the  banks.  Then  again  came 
seven  thin  ugly  cows,  and  they  ate  the  fat  cows  up  but  did 
not  look  any  fatter  themselves.  Then  the  Pharaoh  woke 
up,  and  fell  asleep  again  and  dreamed  another  dream.  In 
this  dream  he  saw  a  stalk  of  corn  with  seven  full  ears  of 
grain  on  it.  But  besides  these  were  seven  small  ears  which 
spoiled  the  others.  Then  Joseph  told  the  Pharaoh  that  the 
dreams  meant  that  there  would  be  seven  years  of  plenty  in 
Egypt,  but  that  they  would  be  followed  by  seven  years  of 
famine.  He  advised  the  Pharaoh  to  choose  a  wise  man  to 
rule  over  the  land  for  him,  and  to  store  up  corn  in  great 
barns  during  the  years  of  plenty,  so  that  there  should  be 
food  for  the  people  in  the  years  of  famine. 

The  Pharaoh  was  so  pleased  with  Joseph  that  he  said  he 
should  be  the  ruler.  He  took  a  ring  from  his  own  hand  and 
put  it  on  Joseph's  finger,  and  dressed  him  in  a  beautiful  robe 
of  silk  with  a  gold  chain  round  his  neck.  And  so  Joseph  was 
the  greatest  man  in  Egypt  after  the  Pharaoh.  During  the 
seven  years  of  plenty  he  stored  up  corn  in  barns ;  and  then 
came  the  seven  years  of  famine,  and  he  gave  the  corn  out  to 
feed  the  hungry  people. 

But  the  famine  spread  over  the  land  of  Canaan  too,  and 
Jacob,  hearing  that  there  was  corn  in  Egypt,  sent  his  sons 
to  see  if  they  could  buy  some.  They  went  to  Joseph,  who 
knew  them  at  once,  though  they  did  not  know  him.  He 
was  so  overcome  at  the  sight  of  them  and  the  memory  of 
his  father,  that  he  turned  away  and  cried.  All  the  brothers 
had  come  except  Benjamin,  and  Joseph  gave  them  corn  and 


20  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

put  their  money  back  again  in  the  top  of  their  sacks.  But 
he  said  they  must  come  again  and  bring  their  brother 
Benjamin  (for  he  longed  to  see  him,  as  he  was  his  brother 
by  the  same  mother).  To  make  quite  sure  he  kept  one  of 
the  brothers,  Simeon,  saying  he  would  not  set  him  free 
until  Benjamin  should  come. 

So  the  brothers  went  sadly  back  to  their  father,  for  they 
knew  it  would  be  a  great  sorrow  to  him  to  let  Benjamin  leave 
him.  Jacob  was  indeed  sad  when  he  heard  that  Simeon  was 
left  behind  in  Egypt,  but  he  declared  he  could  never  let 
Benjamin  go.  But  soon  the  corn  they  had  brought  was 
eaten,  and  the  brothers  reminded  their  father  that  they 
could  only  get  more  if  they  took  Benjamin  to  the  governor 
of  Egypt,  who  was  so  strangely  interested  in  him.  Ruben, 
one  of  the  brothers,  who  had  tried  to  save  Joseph  when  the 
others  wanted  to  kill  him,  promised  that,  whatever  happened, 
he  would  bring  Benjamin  safely  back. 

So  they  went  again  into  Egypt,  and  Joseph  received 
them  with  great  kindness,  though  he  had  to  leave  them  for 
a  time  to  hide  his  tears,  so  overcome  was  he  at  the  sight  of 
his  brother  Benjamin.  He  again  filled  their  sacks  with  corn, 
but  told  his  servants  to  put  a  silver  cup  into  Benjamin's  sack. 
The  sacks  were  placed  upon  the  camels'  backs,  and  the 
brothers  started  for  home.  But  when  they  had  gone  part  of 
the  way  Joseph  sent  servants  after  them  to  bring  them  back, 
saying  they  had  stolen  his  silver  cup.  The  brothers  were 
indignant,  and  so  sure  of  their  own  honesty  that  they  said  they 
would  leave  behind  as  slave  to  Joseph  the  one  in  whose  sack 
the  cup  should  be  found. 

The  sacks  were  emptied  and  the  cup  found  in  Benjamin's 
sack.  Then  Joseph  told  the  other  brothers  that  they  could 
go  home  but  he  would  keep  Benjamin.  They  fell  on  the 
ground  and  told  him  that  they  would  rather  all  stay  as  slaves 
than  face  their  father  without  the  son  he  loved  best.  Then 
Joseph  could  no  longer  keep  his  secret,  but  sent  every  one 
else  away,  and  then  told  his  brothers  that  he   was  Joseph, 


THE  JEWS  AND  THE  PH(ENICIANS  21 

whom  they  had  sold  into  Egypt.  At  first  they  were  afraid, 
but  he  told  them  not  to  fear  and  kissed  them  all,  especially 
Benjamin.  Then  he  sent  them  to  bring  his  father  to  see 
him,  and  Jacob,  full  of  joy,  came  with  all  his  tribe  and  every- 
thing he  had,  and  settled  down  in  the  land  of  Egypt :  and 
here  the  Israelites,  as  his  people  were  called,  lived  for  many 
years,  until  long  after  Jacob  and  Joseph  and  all  his  brothers 
were  dead,  and  many  Pharaohs  too  had  ruled  and  died. 


The  Story  of  Moses 

The  Israelites  became  so  strong,  and  there  were  so  many 
of  them,  that  the  new  Pharaoh,  who  was  probably  an 
Egyptian  and  not  a  Semite,  was  afraid  that  they  would 
become  stronger  than  the  Egyptians  themselves.  So  he 
ordered  that  they  should  do  all  the  hardest  work — building 
cities  for  him  and  making  bricks  :  but  still  the  Israelites  grew 
strong  and  there  were  more  and  more  of  them.  Then  the 
Pharaoh  said  that  every  baby  boy  born  to  the  Hebrews,  as 
the  Egyptians  called  them,  should  be  killed.  He  thought 
that  through  this  there  would  be  none  among  them  to  grow 
up  to  be  men,  and  so  the  Hebrew  people  would  be  destroyed. 
But  some  of  the  mothers  managed  to  hide  their  babies  and 
keep  them  safe. 

There  was  one  woman  who  hid  her  baby  until  he  was 
three  months  old,  and  then,  when  she  found  she  could  not 
do  so  any  longer,  she  put  him  in  a  basket  and  laid  him  on  the 
banks  of  the  river  Nile,  among  the  bulrushes.  She  left  him 
there,  and  his  elder  sister  stood  a  little  way  off  to  see  what 
would  happen  to  him. 

Just  then  an  Egyptian  princess,  the  daughter  of  the 
Pharaoh,  came  down  to  the  river  to  bathe.  She  saw  the 
basket,  and  sent  one  of  her  maids  to  bring  it  to  her.  When 
the  princess  saw  the  baby  lying  inside  it  crying ;  she  felt  very 
sorry  for  it,  and  said  she  would  adopt  it  as  her  own.  Then 
the  baby's   sister   came  and  offered  to  find  a  nurse  for  the 


22  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

child.  She  brought  her  mother,  and  the  princess  gave  her 
the  baby  to  take  care  of  until  it  was  grown  up.  She 
called  him  Moses,  and  when  he  was  grown  up  to  be  a  young 
man  he  was  taken  to  live  at  the  palace.  But  he  always 
remembered  that  he  was  a  Hebrew,  and  he  longed  to  save 
his  people,  who  were  still  cruelly  treated  by  the  Egyptians. 

At  last  Moses  begged  the  Pharaoh  to  allow  him  to  lead 
his  people  out  of  the  land  of  Egypt  into  Canaan  again. 
But  the  Pharaoh  would  not.  Then  all  sorts  of  trouble  fell 
on  the  Egyptians,  and  at  last,  fearing  that  God  was  angry 
with  him  because  he  would  not  let  the  Hebrews  go,  the 
Pharaoh  said  they  might  go,  as  they  had  asked,  to  sacrifice 
to  God  in  the  desert.  But  the  Hebrews  went  forth  at  night 
out  of  the  land  of  Egypt  never  to  enter  it  again.  They 
were  led  by  Moses  and  his  brother  Aaron,  who  was  a  priest, 
and  they  started  on  the  journey  through  the  desert  to  the 
land  of  Canaan,  which  they  called  the  Promised  Land. 

It  was  forty  years  after  all  before  they  reached  it,  and 
during  all  those  years  of  wandering  in  the  desert  they  had 
many  strange  adventures.  Sometimes  they  would  grumble 
against  God  and  wish  themselves  back  in  Egypt.  Sometimes 
they  set  up  idols  and  worshipped  them.  This  made  Moses 
very  angry  and  very  sad.  Once,  while  he  was  away  on  a 
mountain  praying,  the  faithless  people  made  an  image  of  a 
calf  out  of  brass  and  fell  down  and  adored  it.  Moses  was 
so  angry  when  he  came  back  that  he  smashed  the  calf  to 
pieces  and  ground  it  to  powder.  Then  he  sprinkled  it  in 
water  and  made  the  people  drink  it  as  a  punishment. 

The  Ten  Commandments 

It  was  while  he  was  on  the  mountain  praying  that  Moses 
was  inspired  to  write  down  on  tablets  of  stone  the  Ten 
Commandments,  which  have  been  handed  down  from  genera- 
tion to  generation  for  good  people  to  keep,  even  to  our 
own  day. 


THE  JEWS  AND  THE  PHCENICIANS 


23 


Moses  never  entered  the  Promised  Land,  but  died  within 
sight  of  it. 

The  Israelites  settled  down  in  it,  and  at  first  shared  it 
with  other  strange  tribes,  but  gradually  won  it  for  themselves. 
Many  wonderful  stories  are  told  in  the  Bible  of  the  battles  with 
the  other  tribes,  and  the  brave  men,  like  Gideon  and  Samson, 
who  helped  to  win  the  whole  land  of  Canaan  for  the  Jews. 

Soon  the  Jews  stopped  wandering  about  with  large  flocks 
and  herds,  and  instead  became  an  agricultural  people,  and 
cultivated  the  land.  They 
learned  many  things  from  the 
tribes  round  about,  and  became 
more  and  more  civilized.  In 
time  they  chose  a  king  for 
themselves. 

Their  first  king  was  Saul, 
a  handsome  man,  taller  than 
any  of  the  people.  He  was  a 
great  fighter.  While  Saul  was 
still  alive  there  was  a  young 
boy  called  David,  who  killed 
a  giant  called  Goliath  and  many 
other  enemies  of  the  people,  so 
that  the  people  sang,  '  Saul  has 
slain  his  thousands,  but  David 

his  tens  of  thousands,'  which  made  Saul  very  jealous.  He 
tried  to  kill  David,  but  Saul's  son,  Jonathan,  loved  David 
more  than  a  brother,  and  helped  to  save  him  from  the  anger 
of  the  king.  David  became  king  after  Saul,  and  Jonathan 
was  content  that  it  should  be  so.  David  did  many  wrong 
things,  but  he  was  always  very  sorry  for  them  afterwards. 
He  loved  God  very  much,  and  many  of  the  psalms,  the 
beautiful  hymns  in  the  Bible,  are  said  to  have  been  written  by 
David.     The  Bible  calls  him  '  a  man  after  God's  own  heart.' 

After  David,  his  son  Solomon  became  king.     The  Jews 
were  by  this  time  a  great  people.     They  had  conquered  their 


A    PORTRAIT    CARVED    IN    STONE    BY    AN 
EGYPTIAN    OF    A    KING    OF    ISRAEL 

(From  a  bas-relief  at  Karnak  said  to  be 
a  portrait  of  Relioboam). 


24 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


enemies,  and  Solomon  was  a  man  of  peace.  It  was  he  who 
built  the  wonderful  temple  at  Jerusalem.  It  was  built  of  cedar 
wood,  and  overlaid  with  pure  gold,  and  carved  with  wonderful 
statues  and  tracery.  Solomon  had  had  the  cedar  wood,  and 
many  of  the  other  things  which  he  used  for  the  temple, 
brought  from  Phoenicia,  a  land  which  lay  on  the  coast  north 
of  Canaan.  Hiram,  King  of  Tyre,  one  of  the  chief  towns  of 
Phoenicia,  was  a  great  friend  both  of  David  and  Solomon. 


r"!      r  ^-i         "     y^^%c^ 


SHIPS    OF    THE    KING    OF    TYRE    IN    THE    ARABIAN    GULF 
(From  an  Assyrian  stone  carving  made  about  2500  years  ago). 


The  Phoenicians  were  Semites  too,  and  a  very  rich  people. 
They  were  the  first  people  we  know  of  who  made  boats  for 
themselves  and  sailed  away  across  the  sea  to  strange  lands. 
In  the  days  of  Hiram  the  Phoenicians  had  learned  to  build 
quite  big  ships.  At  first  they  had  only  known  how  to  build 
little  rough  boats,  and  had  sailed  carefully  along  the  coast  of 
Canaan  from  place  to  place,  carrying  their  precious  woods  to 
other  people,  and  carrying  back  in  exchange  corn  and  oil  and 
things  which  did  not  grow  in  their  own  land.  Later,  when 
new  tribes  like  the  Israelites  poured  into  the  land  of  Canaan, 
the  Phoenicians  were  pushed  nearer  and  nearer  to  the  coast, 


THE  JEWS  AND  THE  PHCENICIANS         25 

and  began  to  depend  more  and  more  on  their  trade  with 
other  lands. 

Gradually  they  ventured  away  from  the  coast  across  to  the 
island  of  Cyprus,  which  they  could  see  in  the  distance,  and 
then  gradually  they  sailed  right  through  the  Mediterranean  Sea, 
touching  at  the  coasts  of  North  Africa  and  Spain,  into  what 
is  now  the  English  Channel,  and  from  the  South  of  Britain 
they  carried  back  beautiful  pearls  to  their  own  land.  When 
Solomon  saw  how  rich  and  great  the  Phoenicians  had  become 
through  their  trade  he  built  himself  a  fleet  of  ships,  and 
Hiram  lent  him  men  to  build  them.  When  they  were  made 
Hiram  sent  sailors  to  teach  the  Israelites  how  to  manage 
them,  and  so  Phoenicians  and  Israelites  together  sailed 
through  the  Red  Sea  to  Arabia,  and  on  to  India,  and  from 
the  wonderfifl  East  they  brought  back  gold  and  silver  and 
all  kinds  of  precious  things. 

The  reign  of  Solomon  was  the  time  during  which  the 
Israelites  were  richest  and  greatest.  After  his  death  the 
northern  tribes  broke  away  from  the  tribes  of  Judah  and 
Benjamin,  who  lived  in  the  south  of  Canaan.  The  North 
had  one  king  and  the  South  another,  and  in  time  they  became 
separate  peoples.  The  northern  tribes  mixed  with  other 
peoples  in  the  land  of  Canaan,  and  together  they  became 
known  as  the  Samaritans,  whom  we  read  of  in  the  life  of 
our  Lord.  The  tribes  of  Judah  and  Benjamin,  with  their 
capital  and  glorious  temple  at  Jerusalem,  did  not  mingle  with 
the  other  peoples,  but  remained  a  race  apart,  and  to  them  the 
name  of  'Jews'  was  left.  They  did  not  long  remain  an 
independent  people.  Before  very  long  Assyria  conquered 
nearly  all  the  land  of  Asia  round  the  rivers  Tigris  and 
Euphrates  and  westward  to  the  sea. 

The  Jews  fought  hard  against  the  Assyrian  king,  Sen- 
nacherib, and  the  Egyptians  helped  them.  We  read  in 
the  Bible  how  they  were  saved  for  a  time,  for  a  plague 
fell  upon  the  Assyrians.  But  a  hundred  years  later  the  Jews 
were    carried    captive   into   Babylonia,   and   kept  there  for 


26 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


seventy  years,  for  the  Assyrians  and  Babylonians  often  carried 
off  whole  nations  whom  they  had  conquered  in  this  way.  The 
ruler  of  Assyria  at  this  time  was  Nebuchadnezzar.  He  was 
a  great  soldier,  but  he  was  also  a  great  builder.     He  had 

made   for   him   the   hang- 
ing   gardens    of  Babylon, 
which    were    one    of    the 
wonders     of     the     world. 
Seventy -five  arches   were 
built,  one   on   top   of  an- 
s^vi^iuJfiS^l    other,  and  at  the  top  of  all 
'"  "~      were  gardens  of  trees  and 
flowers.       Nebuchadnezzar 
was  a  great  builder  of  walls 
and  temples  too,  and  many 
of  these  have  been  dug  out, 
and  golden  figures  of  gods 
and  gold  tables  and  ornaments  have  been  found.     The  Jews 
were  very  unhappy  in  Babylon,  as  we  read  in  the  Bible,  but 
at  last  they  were  allowed  to  go  back  to  their  own  land. 

During  all  this  time  the  Jews  often  forgot  the  worship  of 
the  one  God,  and  the  observance  of  the  law  of  Moses,  and 
fell  into  idolatry,  and  all  the  wickedness  of  the  people  round 
about  them.  But  they  never  quite  forgot,  and  though  they 
never  again  became  a  great  people,  it  was  from  them  that  the 
great  new  religion  of  Christianity  was  in  time  to  spread  over 
the  world.  Meanwhile  the  Jews  were  subject  to  the  new 
races,  which  one  after  another  raised  great  conquering  king- 
doms in  Europe  or  Asia  or  in  both. 


JEWS    BEWAILING    THE    CAPTIVITY    AT    THE    OLD 

WALL  OF  Solomon's  temple 


CHAPTER   III 

THE  GREEKS 

Gradually  the  interest  of  early  history  moves  from 
Western  Asia  and  Northern  Africa,  where  the  two  great 
early  civilizations  grew  up,  into  Eastern  Europe,  and  we  begin 
to  read  about  people  who  seem  much  more  like  ourselves. 
This  is  partly  because  they  belong  to  the  great  race  of  which 
the  English  are  one  branch,  viz.  the  Aryan  race,  which  rolled 
in  over  Europe  and  almost  swamped  the  earlier  peoples 
already  on  the  land.  The  Aryan  race  invaded  the  north  of 
India  too,  and  became  the  chief  people  there,  as  we  know 
from  the  language  still  spoken  in  the  north  of  India.  It 
sounds  very  different  from  our  own  language,  but  it  is  quite 
plainly  derived,  like  it,  from  the  speech  used  by  all  the  Aryan 
race  before  it  was  dispersed  all  over  the  world.  Another 
great  branch  of  the  Aryan  race  was  the  Persian  people,  who 
swooped  down  upon  the  lands  round  the  Tigris,  the  twin  river 
to  the  Euphrates,  and  founded  a  great  kingdom  there,  and 
then  gradually  conquered  the  whole  of  Western  Asia  and 
Egypt.  The  Persians,  however,  did  not  bring  new  ways  into 
the  lands  they  seized,  but  were  content  to  learn  from  the 
people  they  conquered.  So  people  went  on  building  and 
teaching  and  doing  most  things  in  much  the  same  way  as  they 
had  done  before  the  Persians  came. 

But  in  the  east  of  Europe  there  rose  up  a  great  people 
belonging  to  the  Aryan  race  who  developed  a  very  wonderful 
civilization  of  their  own.  These  were  the  Greeks  or  Hellenes, 
as  they  were  called  at  that  time. 

While  the  Jews  had  been  wandering  from  Mesopotamia 

27 


28 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


into  the  Promised  Land  these  people  had  been  pouring  from 
the  North  into  that  land  which  we  now  call  the  Balkan 
Peninsula,  and  into  the  islands  round  about  it. 

The  Greeks  were  a  very  wonderful  people,  clever  and 
beautiful,  full  of  curiosity  about  men  and  things.  When  we 
first  hear  about  them  they  were  already  quite  civilized.  They 
lived  in  towns  and  built  beautiful  houses,  and  very  early  too 
they  loved  and  made  poetry.  The  first  great  poetry  that  the 
Greeks  made  was  said  to  be  written  by 
a  blind  poet  called  Homer,  but  scholars 
now  think  that  the  Homeric  poems  were 
written  by  many  men  and  handed  down 
from  one  generation  to  another.  They 
tell  of  the  early  days  of  Greece,  and  with 
some  history  is  mixed  much  that  is  legend 
or  mere  story.  The  stories  are  interest- 
ing in  themselves  and  because  they  show 
us  what  the  early  Greeks  thought  was 
great  and  good.  But  the  stories  of 
Ulysses,  of  Jason  and  the  Golden  Fleece, 
of  the  fair  Helen  and  the  great  wooden 
horse  in  which  the  Greek  soldiers  hid 
themselves  and  so  got  within  the  walls  of 
Troy,  should  be  read  merely  as  stories. 
Later  the  Greeks  wrote  plays  and  poems 
as  great  as  any  which  have  ever  been 
written.  Indeed,  it  is  through  Greece  that 
the  other  countries  of  Europe  have  learned  many  of  the  best 
things  they  know.  The  climate  of  Greece  was  so  soft  and 
mild  and  the  country  so  beautiful  that  the  people  were  able 
to  live  very  much  out  of  doors.  They  were  very  healthy  and 
happy,  and  they  loved  beautiful  things.  The  Greeks  tried  to 
bring  up  all  their  children  to  be  strong  and  beautiful,  and 
most  of  them  were  so.  Being  used  to  seeing  only  beautiful 
people  their  artists  and  sculptors  painted  and  modelled 
very  fine  figures,  and  some  of  the  statues  carved  by  these 


A    GREEK    SOLDIER    IN 
homer's    DAY'S 

(From  a  verj-  early  painting  on 
a  Greek  vase). 


THE  GREEKS  29 

old  Greek  artists  remain  to-day  among  the  world's  greatest 
treasures. 

The  Greeks  were  very  proud  of  their  country  and  their 
people.  To  them  the  rest  of  the  world  were  '  barbarians ' 
or  uncivilized.  Their  patriotism  was  fired  by  the  religious 
festivals  in  which  all  the  Greeks  united  to  do  honour  to  their 
gods.  At  first  each  Greek  clan  or  tribe  worshipped  together. 
Each  kindled  and  kept  alight  a  sacred  fire  in  honour  of  the 
gods.  Never  must  the  fire  be  allowed  to  go  out  under  peril 
of  great  disaster  through  the  anger  of  the  gods.  No  barbarian 
stranger  might  bring  fuel  to  the  fire.  The  care  of  it  was  a 
sacred  trust. 

As  time  went  on  some  shrines  became  more  famous  than 
others,  and  to  the  great  temples  there  Greeks  from  all  parts  of 
Greece  would  go  in  great  numbers.  At  Delos  there  was  a  great 
shrine,  and  a  still  more  famous  one  at  Olympia,  a  beautiful 
plain  in  South-Western  Greece  surrounded  by  mountains  and 
forming  a  kind  of  natural  theatre.  Here  every  fourth  year  the 
Olympic  games  were  held  in  honour  of  Zeus,  the  greatest  of 
the  gods  honoured  by  the  Greeks.  At  the  Olympic  games 
the  best  runners  from  all  parts  of  Greece  ran  races.  Rich 
men  brought  their  chariots  and  competed  in  racing  too. 
Poets  brought  their  offerings  of  hymns  written  and  sung  in 
honour  of  the  gods.  The  victors  in  each  contest,  those  whom 
the  judges  thought  the  best,  were  crowned  before  all  the 
people  with  wreaths  of  wild  olive,  while  the  name  of  their 
fathers  and  the  districts  from  which  they  came  were  cried 
aloud  so  that  the  people  might  do  them  honour. 

Yet,  though  the  Greeks  could  thus  unite  for  worship  and 
patriotism,  they  were  not  all  joined  together  in  one  kingdom 
like  the  English  or  French  to-day.  Each  town  with  the 
country  round  it  had  at  first  its  own  government.  This  was 
chiefly  because  the  land  was  broken  up  by  deep  bays  on  the 
coast  and  by  mountain  ranges  inland,  a,nd  it  was  difficult  for 
the  people  in  one  part  of  the  country  to  travel  to  another 
part.     So  there  were   many  states  such   as  Corinth,  Delos, 


30  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

and  Thebes,  and  more  famous  still  than  these,  Sparta  and 
Athens. 

For  a  time  after  the  Greek  people  had  settled  down 
each  state  had  its  king.  The  first  king  would  probably 
be  the  bravest  soldier  who  had  led  the  people  to  victory 
in  war,  but  when  he  died  his  son  would  become  king, 
and  then  his  grandson,  and  in  time  some  of  the  kings 
were  not  brave  men  at  all,  and  nearly  everywhere  in  Greece 
the  people  said  they  would  not  have  kings  any  longer,  but 
chose  several  of  the  greatest  men  in  the  land  to  rule  them 
instead.  Government  by  a  few  great  men  was  called  by  the 
Greeks  an  'aristocracy.'  Generally  in  time  the  states  grew 
tired  of  the  aristocracies  too,  if  they  became  proud  and  selfish, 
and  in  most  Greek  states  some  one  man  seized  power  again. 
He  was  not  a  king,  but  was  called  a  '  tyrant,'  which  did  not 
mean  a  cruel  and  selfish  person  as  it  does  now.  Soon  again 
in  nearly  every  Greek  state  the  tyrants  were  overthrown,  and 
some  states  chose  once  more  to  be  governed  by  an  aristocracy. 
Sparta  chose  thus,  and  was  so  governed  as  long  as  she 
remained  a  state.  But  some  of  the  states  declared  that  all 
the  people  should  have  a  share  in  the  government,  and  these 
were  called  democracies. 

The  greatest  of  these  was  the  state  of  Athens,  whose 
people  were  perhaps  the  bravest  and  most  beautiful,  and 
certainly  the  cleverest  in  the  whole  of  Greece.  Athens  was 
the  most  beautiful  of  all  the  Greek  city-states.  Every  one 
of  its  people  was  educated,  and  every  man  had  a  vote  and 
took  a  direct  part  in  the  government.  The  state  was  so 
small  that  all  the  men  could  meet  together  to  choose 
their  leader.  It  was  a  very  vivid  eager  life  which  the 
Athenians  led,  all  keenly  interested  in  politics,  in  philosophy 
and  in  artistic  things.  In  Athens,  every  Greek  had  time  and 
opportunity  to  hear  beautiful  poetry,  to  see  good  plays  acted 
in  theatres  open  to  the  air.  All  took  an  interest  in  the  build- 
ing of  temples  and  in  the  beautiful  statues  made  to  adorn 
them.     Perhaps  no  nation  in  history  has  ever  had  so  fine  a 


THE  GREEKS  31 

people,  so  little  poverty,  and  so  much  education.  But  it  must 
be  remembered  that  in  Athens,  as  everywhere  in  Greece, 
there  were  many  slaves,  who  did  the  hardest  work,  and  so 
made  possible  the  brighter  lives  of  their  masters.  The  Greek 
*  democracy '  was  not  like  the  modern  democracy  which  most 
people  think  is  the  best  form  of  government.  The  Greeks 
did  not  consider  the  welfare  of  all  the  people,  and  in  modern 
nations  where  all  are  free  the  problem  of  making  all  happy 
and  comfortable  is  more  difficult. 


The  Spartans 

Sparta,  the  other  great  city-state  in  the  south  of  Greece, 
was  not  a  democracy,  but  remained  an  aristocracy.  Its  people 
were  sterner  and  not  so  bright  perhaps  as  the  Athenians. 
They  believed  that  every  man  should  be  a  soldier,  and  every 
boy  was  taken  from  his  mother  when  he  was  seven  years  old 
and  brought  up  with  other  boys  and  taught  how  to  fight.  A 
Spartan  boy  would  never  cry  whatever  happened.  He  never 
thought  about  being  warm  and  comfortable,  but  wore  the 
same  clothes  summer  and  winter  and  cared  only  to  be  strong 
and  brave.  This  was  the  ideal  of  the  Spartans,  the  thing  they 
lived  for.  The  women  felt  just  the  same  as  the  men  about  it, 
and  the  mothers  gave  up  their  boys  willingly  for  the  sake 
of  the  state.  The  girls  shared  the  games  and  races  with 
the  boys,  and  grew  up  strong  and  brave  women.  A  mother 
would  much  rather  that  her  son  should  die  in  battle  than  give 
in.  '  Return  with  your  shield  or  upon  it,'  she  would  say  as 
her  son  went  forth  to  battle. 

Besides  the  Greeks  in  the  Balkan  Peninsula  and  in  the 
islands  round  about  it  there  were  others  who  had  gone  forth 
across  the  sea  and  built  cities  on  the  coast  west  of  the  land 
now  called  Asia  Minor. 

Since  the  Phoenicians  had  led  the  way  men  knew  much 
more  about  ships  and  how  to  sail  the  seas  safely,  and  some  of 
the  more  adventurous  Greeks  had  sailed  westwards  and  set 


32  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

up  towns  in  Sicily  and  in  the  south  of  Italy.  Some  of  these 
were  very  rich  and  beautiful.  The  towns  on  the  coast  of 
Asia  Minor,  too,  flourished  and  grew  rich,  and  were  full  of 
beautiful  temples,  for  the  Greeks  during  many  hundreds  of 
years  worshipped  many  gods.  It  was  a  long  time  before  their 
cleverest  men  realized  that  there  could  be  only  one  God,  and 
then  the  people  were  very  angry  with  them  for  saying  so. 
Meanwhile,  they  built  their  temples  to  Apollo  the  god  of 
beauty,  or  to  Diana  the  goddess,  whom  they  pictured  as  a 
huntress,  young,  brave,  and  noble,  armed  with  bow  and  arrow, 
and  with  fluttering  graceful  garments  short  to  the  knees.  There 
was  one  famous  temple  of  Diana  at  Ephesus,  one  of  the  chief 
Greek  towns  in  Asia  Minor.  We  read  in  the  Bible  how  in  later 
days  St.  Paul  tried  to  teach  the  Ephesians  about  our  Lord, 
and  how  they  clung  to  the  worship  of  their  goddess.  But  long 
before  this  a  great  danger  had  threatened  Ephesus  and  the  other 
Greek  settlements  in  Asia  Minor,  a  danger  which  threatened 
Greece,  too,  and  which  was  so  great  that  in  the  end  the 
Greeks  joined  together  to  resist  it. 

The  Persians 

For  hundreds  of  years  the  Greek  towns  in  Asia  Minor, 
like  those  at  home  in  Greece,  and  the  colonies  in  Sicily  and 
the  south  of  Italy,  were  prosperous  and  free,  but  at  length 
they  fell  under  the  power  of  the  Lydians,  a  people  who 
possessed  the  land  near.  The  Lydian  king,  Croesus,  had 
conquered  most  of  Asia  Minor,  and  had  demanded  tribute  of 
the  Greek  cities  there.  Croesus  was  wonderfully  powerful  and 
rich,  but  he  fell  in  his  turn  before  the  Persian  power,  which 
had  now  spread  westward  over  Babylonia  and  on  to  the  very 
coast.  When,  last  of  all,  the  Greek  cities  there  were 
attacked  by  this  great  barbaric  power,  they  sent  distressful 
messages  to  their  kinsmen  in  Greece  proper,  and  Athens 
determined  to  send  them  help. 

This  decision  of  the  Athenian  people  is  one  of  the  turning- 


THE  GREEKS  33 

points  in  the  world  s  history.  If  Athens  had  not  fought 
against  Persia  and  won,  the  Persian  power  might  have  spread 
from  Asia  to  Europe,  and  the  whole  history  of  the  world 
would  have  been  changed.  The  Persians  belonged  to  the 
Aryan  people,  but  they  were  quite  unlike  the  Aryan  people 
in  Europe.  They  were  brave  men,  but  they  had  no  idea  of 
the  freedom  which  was  the  ideal  of  the  Greeks.  With  the 
Persians,  as  with  most  Eastern  people  before  and  since,  the 
will  of  the  king  was  the  supreme  law.  On  his  word  depended 
life  and  death.  The  greatest  nobles  bowed  before  him  as 
though  he  had  been  a  god.  His  court  was  full  of  beautiful 
things,  and  life  seemed  gay  and  brilliant,  but  there  was  a 
sense  of  uneasiness,  for  under  a  cruel  or  capricious  king  no 
man  could  feel  that  even  his  life  was  safe. 

A  story  is  told  of  the  cruelty  of  one  of  these  early  kings. 
A  nobleman  had  offended  him,  but  the  king  pretended  to 
forgive  him  and  invited  him  to  a  feast.  At  the  end  of  the 
meal  the  king  asked  him  what  he  thought  of  the  food,  and 
when  he  had  been  assured  that  it  was  excellent,  the  king 
called  for  a  basket  and  showed  it  to  his  guest.  In  it  were 
the  head,  hands,  and  feet  of  the  nobleman's  own  child,  and 
the  king  maliciously  told  him  that  the  food  that  he  had  eaten 
was  his  child's  body. 

The  poor  people  were  very  poor  and  often  unhappy. 
Women  were  hardly  thought  of  as  human  beings,  and 
children  could  be  sold  by  their  parents  as  slaves.  The 
'  Great  King '  could  lead  great  armies  to  battle,  but  the 
soldiers  did  not  feel  that  they  were  fighting  for  their  father- 
lands. They  won  because  of  their  great  numbers,  and 
because  they  were  often  fighting  men  very  like  themselves. 
But  things  turned  out  very  differently  when  the  Persians 
found  themselves  fighting  with  the  Greeks,  men  who  loved 
freedom  and  beauty  and  goodness,  men  who  were  full  of 
pride  in  their  people  and  respect  for  themselves. 

When  Croesus  was  conquered  by  the  Persian  king,  Cyrus, 
the   Greek  cities  had   been   forced   to  give  in   to  him   too. 


84 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


Instead  of  the  mere  tribute  that  they  had  paid  to  Croesus, 
they  were  placed  under  Persian  governors  and  treated  as  a 
conquered  people.  One  town,  Miletus,  was  allowed  some 
sort  of  independence,  but  even  there  the  people  never  felt 
really  safe.  The  tyrant  of  Miletus  had  been  carried  off  into 
honourable  captivity  with  the  Persian  king,  but  had  left  his 

son-in-law,  Aristagoras,  to 
govern  Miletus.  The  rulers 
of  the  other  cities  had  become 
mere  servants  of  Persia,  and 
so  the  people  determined  to 
get  rid  of  them  and  set  up 
democratic  governments.  This 
they  did.  Aristagoras  took 
the  lead  in  the  movement, 
gave  up  his  power  into  the 
hands  of  the  people,  and  when, 
in  the  year  500  B.C.,  the  Greek 
cities  of  Asia  Minor  announced 
that  they  would  no  longer 
live  under  Persian  rule,  it  was 
Aristagoras  who  went  over  to 
Greece  proper  to  ask  help  of 
the  Greeks  there  for  their 
kinsmen  over  the  sea.  He 
went  first  to  Sparta,  and  told 
them  first  of  the  sad  state  of 
the  Greeks  in  Asia  Minor,  and 
then  of  the  riches  of  the 
Persians.  It  would  be  easy,  he  said,  to  conquer  the  Persians, 
barbarians  who  wore  trousers  and  turbans,  and  then  all  the 
wealth  of  Persia  would  be  theirs.  But  the  Spartans  refused 
to  go. 

Then  Aristagoras  went  on  to  Athens,  and  again  told  his 
tale.  The  Athenians  had  but  lately  got  rid  of  their  tyrants. 
They  were  full  of  spirits  and  courage.     Aristagoras  reminded 


THE    ROYAL    AHCHERS    OF    KING    DARIUS 
OF    PERSIA 

(From  some  beautifully  painted  bricks  on  the 
walls  of  the  ancient  palace  of  Darius  at  Susa). 


THE  GREEKS  35 

them  that  Miletus,  the  chief  town  suffering  under  the 
Persians,  had  been  founded  by  people  from  Athens.  The 
Athenians  determined  to  give  them  help,  and  sent  twenty 
ships  across  the  seas.  The  Lydian  town  of  Sardis  was 
accidentally  burnt,  and  the  Athenians,  without  giving  further 
help,  went  back  to  their  ships,  and  so  home.  It  was  after- 
wards said  that  the  new  Persian  king,  Darius,  was  so  angry 
with  the  Athenians  that  he  told  one  of  his  servants  to 
remind  him  before  every  meal  of  the  vengeance  he  was  to 
take  on  them.  But  it  was  eleven  years  before  Darius  tried 
to  revenge  himself  on  the  Athenians.  Meanwhile  he  turned 
his  anger  against  Miletus  and  the  other  rebel  cities.  Miletus 
was  taken,  and  many  of  its  men  were  killed.  The  others  were 
sent  with  the  women  and  children  to  a  town  far  away  on  the 
river  Tigris,  and  there  had  to  live  out  their  lives  as  exiles  far 
from  home  and  country.  The  other  rebellious  cities  were 
badly  treated  too,  and  then,  after  eleven  years,  Darius  turned 
to  take  vengeance  on  the  Athenians  who  had  dared  to  defy 
him.  He  sent  messengers  to  Greece  asking  the  states  to  send 
him  earth  and  water,  as  a  sign  that  they  would  consent  to  live 
under  the  yoke  of  the  *  Great  King,'  as  he  called  himself. 

The  Battle  of  Marathon 

Some  of  the  states  did  so,  but  Athens  and  Sparta  proudly 
refused ;  and  it  is  said  that  Sparta  threw  the  Persian 
messengers  into  a  pit,  and  told  them  to  find  earth  and  water 
for  themselves  there.  In  the  same  year,  490  B.C.,  Darius  pre- 
pared a  great  fleet  of  ships,  filled  them  with  soldiers,  and 
sent  them  against  the  Athenians.  Thousands  and  thousands 
of  them  clothed  in  mail  poured  from  the  ships  into  the  plain 
of  Marathon,  which  was  twenty  miles  from  Athens  and 
belonged  to  it.  The  Athenians  sent  for  help  to  Sparta,  but 
were  told  that  no  help  could  be  sent  until  after  a  religious 
festival,  which  was  still  some  days  off*.  The  Spartans  were 
never  very  ready  to  join  with  the  Athenians,  for  the   two 


36 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


states  were  very  jealous  of  each  other.  It  is  said  that 
Pheippides,  the  runner  chosen  to  carry  the  message  to  Sparta, 
ran  all  the  way  in  two  days.  The  distance  was  one  hundred 
and  fifty  miles. 

When  he  came  back  the  Athenians  stood  on  the  mountains 
looking  down  upon  the  plain  of  Marathon,  and  the  generals 
consulted  together  as  to  what  should  be  done. 
Miltiades,  one  of  the  generals,  advised  an  imme- 
diate attack,  and  the  others  gave  up  their  power 
to  him,  and  he  arranged  the  battle  according  to 
his  will.  The  Athenians  by  his  orders  plunged 
down  from  the  mountains  on  to  the  Persian 
army  in  the  plain.  There  were  five  times  as 
many  Persians  as  Greeks,  but  the  shock  was  so 
great,  and  the  Athenians  fought  so  well,  that 
the  great  awkward  army  of  men,  who  had  no 
knowledge  of  what  freedom  meant,  were  driven 
into  the  sea  and  back  to  their  ships  by  the 
splendid  Greek  soldiers. 

The  Greeks  clung  on  to  the  Persian  ships, 
meaning  to  set  fire  to  them,  but  the  Persians 
slashed  savagely  at  them.  The  brother  of 
^schylus,  the  great  poet  and  writer  of  plays, 
who  also  fought  at  Marathon,  had  his  hands 
cut  off  as  he  clung  to  a  ship,  and  then  he  held 

(From  a  Greek  tomb    q^     by     his     tCCth.         All     but     SCVCU      shlpS      ffOt 
on  the  battlefield).  rni  -r.  •  -i      i  i 

away.  Ihe  Persians  sailed  round  to  attack 
the  harbour  of  Athens  next  morning,  but  the  Greek  soldiers, 
weary  as  they  were  from  the  battle,  marched  to  meet  them, 
and  when  the  Persians  saw  the  men  who  had  just  conquered 
them  drawn  up  again  to  face  them,  they  gave  up  the  attack 
and  sailed  away  in  disgust. 

So  Athens  saved  Greece,  and  probably  Europe ;  for 
Darius,  if  he  had  conquered  Greece,  might  have  spread  his 
empire  over  the  whole  of  Europe,  and  the  ideas  of  freedom 
and   art   and    beauty   which    the   Greeks   taught   the  world 


A    SOLDIER    OF 
MARATHON 


THE  GREEKS  37 

might  have  been  lost.  The  Athenians  built  a  great  monu- 
ment on  the  plain  of  Marathon  to  commemorate  their  victory, 
and  they  made  the  men  of  the  little  town  of  Plat^ea  citizens 
of  Athens.  Platsea  alone  of  the  Greek  states  had  helped 
the  Athenians,  and  the  thousand  men  whom  they  had  sent 
were  among  the  bravest  and  best  fighters  in  the  great 
battle. 

Miltiades,  the  victorious  general,  soon  fell  into  disgrace. 
He  asked  the  Athenians  to  ht  out  for  him  a  fleet  of  ships, 
but  begged  them  to  allow  him  to  keep  as  a  secret  the  purpose 
for  which  he  wanted  them,  promising  to  bring  a  great  deal  of 
money  back.  Then  he  sailed  away  to  fight  an  enemy  of  his 
own  who  lived  in  Paros,  an  island  near.  He  was  not  able  to 
take  the  city,  and  sailed  back  again  to  Athens  without  having 
done  anything  and  without  the  money  he  had  promised. 
The  Athenians  were  very  angry,  and  Miltiades  would  have 
been  put  to  death  but  for  the  memory  of  his  courage  and 
cleverness  at  Marathon.  He  was  ordered  to  pay  a  fine  of  a 
large  sum  of  money,  but  died  before  he  had  time  to  do  so. 
Some  people  have  blamed  the  Athenians  for  having  been  so 
severe  against  a  man  who  had  done  so  much  for  them,  and 
they  have  said  that  people  governed  as  democracies  are  always 
changeable.  Still,  Miltiades  had  no  right  to  use  his  country's 
money  to  take  revenge  on  his  own  enemies. 

Yet  the  Athenians  were  perhaps  a  little  changeable,  for 
they  showed  it  in  their  treatment  of  others.  The  two  chief 
men  in  Athens  after  Marathon  were  Themistocles  and 
Aristides.  Themistocles  was  anxious  that  the  Athenians 
should  build  a  fleet,  and  so  be  able  to  fight  on  sea  as  well  as 
on  land,  while  Aristides  would  have  preferred  a  policy  of 
peace.  In  the  end  Themistocles  got  his  way  and  Aristides 
was  banished,  for  the  Athenians  had  a  custom  of  sending 
troublesome  politicians  into  exile,  so  that  they  should  not 
hamper  the  rulers  at  home.  When  the  votes  were  being 
given  as  to  whether  Aristides  should  go  or  stay,  one  man  at 
least  was  said  to  have  voted  against  him  because  he  was 


38  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

*  tired  of  hearing  him  called  Aristides  the  Just.'  Aristides 
was  not  long  away,  for  Persia  soon  threatened  again,  and 
Athens  was  glad  to  call  back  all  the  exiles  who  had  been  sent 
away  after  Marathon. 

The  Persian  Invasion  of  Greece 

Darius  went  back  to  Persia  determined  to  prepare  a 
monster  invasion  of  Greece  and  so  take  his  revenge,  but 
he  died  before  he  had  time  to  carry  it  out,  and  the  work 
was  left  for  his  son  Xerxes,  who  became  king  after  him. 

Xerxes  invaded  Greece  in  the  year  480  b.c.  He  had 
endless  resources  at  his  disposal  in  men  and  money.  Fear- 
ing the  stormy  sea  round  the  Cape  of  Mount  Athos, 
which  his  fleet  would  have  to  pass  on  its  way  to  the  Greek 
peninsula,  he  ordered  great  gangs  of  men  to  cut  a  deep 
channel  through  it,  so  that  two  ships  could  easily  sail  through 
side  by  side.  Then  he  ordered  bridges  of  boats  to  be  made 
across  the  Hellespont,  and  in  the  towns,  all  along  the  way  by 
which  his  army  would  have  to  go,  he  stored  great  quantities 
of  food.  He  meant  to  avoid  all  risk.  The  first  bridge  broke 
because  the  ropes  were  not  strong  enough,  and  Xerxes 
ordered  that  the  men  who  had  built  it  should  be  beheaded. 
In  his  mad  anger  he  ordered,  too,  that  the  water  of  the 
Hellespont  should  be  whipped  with  rods,  receiving  three 
hundred  lashes  for  its  defiance  of  the  Great  King. 

Then  the  bridges  were  built  again  with  stronger  bonds,  and 
in  a  fit  of  repentance  or  amiability  Xerxes  poured  wine  from  a 
golden  bowl  into  the  Hellespont,  and  then  flung  the  cup  and 
a  golden  bowl  and  a  sword  into  the  water,  at  sunrise  of  the 
day  when  he  was  at  length  ready  to  lead  his  great  unwieldy 
army  into  Greece.  The  baggage,  with  the  camels  and  horses, 
crossed  on  one  bridge  and  the  soldiers  on  the  other.  The 
first  to  cross  were  ten  thousand  Persians,  the  flower  of  the 
army,  brave  strong  men  accustomed  to  conquer.  Behind 
them  went  the  sacred  horses  and  a  chariot,  empty  in  honour 
of  the  gods,  and  Xerxes  himself  drove  after.     Behind  him 


THE  GREEKS  39 

straggled  an  enormous  host,  to  the  number  of  at  least  a 
million  men,  drawn  from  the  peoples  conquered  by  the 
Persians,  and  with  no  heart  for  the  fight.  So  great  was  the 
crowd  that  the  two  bridges  were  filled  with  men  and  animals 
crossing  over  during  seven  days  and  seven  nights. 

It  is  said  that  one  old  man  who  had  sent  four  sons  to  the 
army  begged  that  the  fifth  might  stay  at  home,  but  Xerxes, 
instead  of  granting  the  favour,  ordered  that  the  boy  should 
be  killed,  and  the  pieces  of  his  body  placed  on  both  sides  of 
the  bridge  as  a  warning  to  others  who  might  wish  to  hang 
back.  Any  who  were  slow  to  cross  were  freely  lashed  with 
whips.  Xerxes  could  not  realize  that  fear  will  never  lead  an 
army  to  victory. 

When  the  Greeks  had  seen  the  danger  threatening  from 
Persia,  some  of  the  states  had  been  very  anxious  that  the 
whole  of  Greece  should  join  to  resist  it.  A  congress  of  the 
states  was  called  to  meet  at  the  Isthmus  of  Corinth.  The 
part  of  Greece  south  of  the  isthmus  was  called  the 
Peloponnesus,  and  here  Sparta  was  the  chief  state,  and  had 
great  power  over  the  others.  So  nearly  all  the  Pelo- 
ponnesians  naturally  joined  with  Sparta,  though  Argos,  a 
Peloponnesian  town,  held  aloof,  declaring  she  would  rather 
be  ruled  by  the  Persians  than  help  Sparta,  whom  she  hated. 
In  the  end  very  few  of  the  states  north  of  the  Isthmus  of 
Corinth  joined  in  the  defence.  There  was,  of  course,  Athens 
and  the  people  of  Phocis,  and  the  faithful  little  town  of 
Platsea,  and  Thespise,  another  town  near.  But  most  of  the 
northern  Greeks  held  aloof,  and  some  hastened  to  send  earth 
and  water  to  the  Great  King.  Themistocles  had  his  fleet 
ready,  and  was  longing  for  a  good  sea  fight,  but  as  Sparta 
was  the  chief  state  in  all  Greece  for  the  moment,  the  chief 
command  was  given  to  them  both  by  land  and  sea. 

The  Story  ,of  Thermopylae 

As  ranges  of  mountains  stretch  across  the  north  of 
Greece,  the  Greeks  knew  that  the  Persian  army  must  come 


40  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

through  mountain  passes.  They  decided  to  make  a  stand 
at  the  Pass  of  Thermopylae,  for  if  the  Persians  could  get 
through  that,  there  would  be  nothing  to  stop  them  until  they 
reached  the  Isthmus  of  Corinth.  A  band  of  men  were 
therefore  set  under  the  Spartan  king,  Leonidas,  to  guard  the 
pass.  More  Spartans  were  to  be  sent  later  when  a  feast 
should  be  over.  The  Spartans  would  never  let  anything 
interfere  with  their  sacred  feasts.  However,  Leonidas  knew 
that  a  few  men  could  hold  the  pass  easily  against  even  the 
immense  army  of  Xerxes,  but  unfortunately  a  treacherous 
Greek  went  to  Xerxes  and  told  him  that  to  the  west  of  the 
Pass  of  Thermopylse  was  a  path  over  a  mountain  which 
could  not  easily  be  defended.  Leonidas  had  placed  some 
Phocians  there,  but  when  they  saw  vast  numbers  of  Persians 
advancing  they  turned  and  fled. 

News  came  to  Leonidas  that  the  Persians  were  advanc- 
ing, and  he  knew  that  there  was  no  hope  for  those  who  should 
remain  to  guard  the  pass  now  that  it  would  be  attacked  from 
both  ends.  So  he  told  his  army  that  those  who  wished  might 
go  away,  but  that  he  himself  would  stay  and  die  fighting 
the  enemy.  Three  hundred  Spartan  soldiers  with  their  slaves, 
and  seven  hundred  others  chose  to  stay,  only  about  a  thousand 
men  in  all.  The  Spartans  were  never  afraid,  not  even  of 
death,  and  they  spent  their  time  making  an  elaborate  toilet, 
combing  out  their  thick  hair,  which  they  wore  long,  putting 
on  dresses  of  bright  scarlet,  and  polishing  their  weapons,  so 
that  they  might  face  death  with  every  sign  of  joy. 

As  the  Persians  poured  into  the  plain  south  of  the  pass, 
Leonidas  told  his  men  to  fight  their  way  out  of  the  northern 
end  ;  and  there  he  and  his  little  band  died  fighting  desperately, 
killing  far  more  Persians  than  their  own  numbers.  The 
Persians  were  astounded  at  such  courage,  and  angry  too  that 
so  many  of  their  own  men  were  killed  by  a  mere  handful 
of  Greeks.  Two  brothers  of  the  Great  King  himself  were 
among  the  dead.  Later  the  Greeks  built  monuments  on  the 
spot  where  the  heroes  of  Thermopylae  had  fought,  and  chief 


C      ^Andros 

<^  Syros 

SenphosQ   Paros^Q, 


stypalasa 


Greek  Stadia 


ELnglish  Miles 


iartbolomen  Edii 


300     ^00     500 


42  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

among  them  was  a  marble  lion  to  honour  the  memory  of 
Leonidas. 

In  spite  of  the  heroism  of  Leonidas  and  his  Spartans  all 
Greece,  as  far  as  the  Isthmus  of  Corinth,  now  lay  open  to  the 
Persians,  and  as  they  marched  south  the  states  gave  in  their 
allegiance.  Platsea  and  Thespise  were  beaten  down  to  the 
ground,  and  the  Athenians,  seeing  that  there  was  no  hope  for 
them,  took  refuge  on  the  fleet,  and  were  carried  off  to 
Salamis  and  other  places  of  safety.  One  of  the  oracles  had 
advised  them  to  trust  to  a  wooden  wall,  and  this  they  thought 
meant  their  wooden  boats ;  but  a  few  men  remained  behind 
in  the  Acropolis,  the  hill  centre  of  the  town,  which  could  not 
be  entered  when  the  gates  were  shut  except  at  one  side. 
Across  this  side  the  Athenians  who  remained  placed  great 
beams  of  wood  to  form  a  kind  of  wall,  hoping  thus  to  fulfil 
the  words  of  the  oracle,  and  take  shelter  behind  a  wooden 
wall.  When  the  Persians  advanced  to  attack  them  they 
threw  great  stones  down  on  their  heads.  But  it  was  of  no 
use,  for  the  Persians  broke  through  the  barrier,  killed  the 
Greeks,  and  practically  destroyed  Athens. 

Thus  the  fate  of  the  Greeks  on  land  was  sad  enough,  in 
spite  of  their  great  courage ;  but  there  was  still  the  fleet,  in 
which  Themistocles  had  put  so  much  trust.  The  Persian 
fleet,  off  the  coast  near  Thermopylae,  had  suffered  much  from 
storms,  and  in  a  fight  they  had  with  the  Greeks,  though  the 
Greeks  lost  some  ships,  the  Persians  lost  more.  When  the 
news  came  of  the  destruction  of  Athens  the  Greek  fleet  was 
at  Salamis.  Themistocles  could  not  persuade  the  leaders  to 
sail  forth  and  attack  the  Persians.  One  of  the  generals  said 
to  Themistocles,  '  O  Themistocles,  those  who  stand  up  in  the 
game  too  soon  are  whipped '  (referring  to  a  rule  in  the  Greek 
games) ;  but  Themistocles  answered,  *  Yes,  but  those  who 
start  late  are  not  crowned.' 

At  length  Themistocles  had  recourse  to  a  trick.  He  sent 
word  to  the  Persians  that  the  Greek  fleet  was  very  frightened, 
and  was  going  to  sail  away.     The  Persians  then  thought  it 


THE  GREEKS 


43 


AN    EARLY    GREEK    WARSHIP 


(From  a  painting  on  a  Greek  vase  made  in  the  sixth  century  b.c). 


would  be  best  to  attack  the  Greeks  before  they  could 
escape,  and  one  morning  the  Greek  fleet  found  the  whole 
Persian  fleet  drawn  up  to  the  east,  ready  to  fight. 

The  Greeks 
then  showed  that 
they  could  fight 
on  sea  as  well  as 
on  land,  in  spite 
of  their  hesita- 
tion. They  dashed 
in  and  broke  the 
front  line  of  the 
Persian  ships,  and 
drove  the  two 
back  lines  in  con- 
fusion upon  each 
other.    On  sea,  as 

on  land,  the  Persian  forces  were  too  awkward  and  unwieldy. 
There  was  really  not  room  for  so  many  ships.  The  battle 
became  fast  and  furious.  When  a  Persian  ship  was  sunk  the 
men  were  drowned,  for  few  of  them  could  swim ;  while  many 
Greeks  even  from  ships  which  were  destroyed  saved  themselves 
by  swimming  to  the  shore. 

Xerxes  had  one  ally  who  was  a  woman,  Queen  Artemisia 
of  Halicarnassus  in  Caria.  The  Greeks  had  promised  a  prize 
to  whomsoever  should  capture  her ;  but  when  a  Greek  ship 
was  chasing  her  she  wilfully  sank  a  Persian  ship  which  came 
in  her  way.  The  Greek  captain  seeing  this,  and  not  knowing 
it  was  Artemisia's  ship,  gave  up  the  chase,  thinking  that  she 
had  deserted  from  the  Persians. 

Xerxes  sat  on  a  great  white  marble  throne  on  the  shore 
and  watched  the  battle.  Even  at  the  end  the  Persians  had 
twice  as  many  ships  as  the  Greeks,  but  so  many  men  and  ships 
had  been  destroyed  that  they  had  no  longer  any  heart  for  the 
fight.  Orders  were  given  that  the  fleet  should  sail  away ;  and 
Xerxes  himself,  sick  at  heart  with  disappointment,  collected 


44  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

what  remained  of  his  vast  army,  and  crossed  the  Helles- 
pont in  haste,  lest  the  Greek  fleet  should  come  to  stop 
him.  Three  hundred  thousand  Persians  remained  in  Greece 
under  the  general  Mardonius  to  make  one  more  attempt  in 
the  next  year  at  the  conquest  of  this  small  country,  which  had 
thus  defied  the  giant  armies  of  the  Great  King. 

Xerxes  met  with  endless  misfortunes  on  the  journey  home. 
The  bridges  across  the  Hellespont  broke  ;  the  ice  gave  way  on 
a  frozen  river  as  the  army  crossed  it ;  provisions  ran  short  and 
disease  broke  out.  Men  and  animals  died  in  thousands. 
Mardonius  spent  the  winter  in  Thessaly,  and  in  the  spring 
started  again  towards  Athens.  Once  more  the  Athenians 
withdrew  to  Salamis,  and  their  city  was  again  ravaged  by  the 
enemy.  The  Athenians  sent  indignant  messages  to  the 
Spartans,  who  had  again  failed  to  help  them,  because  their 
religious  festivals  held  them  back.  Meanwhile  they  had 
built  a  strong  wall  across  the  Isthmus  of  Corinth.  It  is  said 
that  some  one  pointed  out  to  them  that  the  Athenians  might 
in  the  end  join  the  Persians  against  Sparta,  and  that  their 
strong  wall  would  be  of  little  use  if  the  Athenians  with  their 
magnificent  fleet  attacked  them  by  sea. 

At  last  the  Spartans  sent  an  army  to  join  the  Athenians, 
and  Mardonius  withdrew  north  into  Boeotia,  which  was  better 
country  for  his  cavalry  to  fight  in.  Help  from  other  Greek 
states  now  poured  in,  and  Mardonius,  anxious  to  break  up  the 
Greek  army,  sent  Masistios,  the  commander  second  to  himself, 
to  attack  Megara.  The  Athenians  detached  themselves  from 
the  general  army  and  went  to  their  aid.  Masistios  was  a 
handsome  man,  and  almost  a  giant  in  height.  He  wore  a 
suit  of  golden  mail,  and  over  it  a  tunic  of  crimson.  His 
white  horse  was  shot  under  him,  and  though  his  mail  resisted 
all  arrows  for  a  time,  he  was  at  last  shot  through  the  eye  and 
killed.  The  Athenians  won  the  victory,  and  the  body  of 
Masistios  was  carried  in  triumph  along  the  lines  of  the  Greek 
army  that  all  might  see  it. 

Mardonius   waited   several    days  before   he   ventured  to 


THE  GREEKS  45 

attack  the  Greeks,  and  then  one  day,  when  the  Spartans  were 
making  a  change  in  their  position,  he  led  his  army  against 
them  alone.  The  Athenians  were  surrounded  by  the 
Greeks,  who  were  helping  the  Persians,  and  so  the  Spartans 
fought  the  famous  battle  of  Platsea  practically  alone  against 
the  Persians.  The  splendid  Persian  cavalry  tried  to  break 
the  solid  mass  of  the  Spartan  ranks,  but  failed.  The  heavily 
armed  and  mailed  foot  soldiers  of  Sparta  broke  down  the 
hedge  of  shields,  behind  which  the  light-armed  foot  soldiers 
of  the  Persian  army  stood  ;  and  though  it  was  a  hard -fought 
battle,  and  the  Persians  were  overwhelmingly  greater  in 
numbers  than  the  Spartans,  the  splendid  discipline  of  the 
Greeks  won  the  day.  Mardonius  himself  was  killed,  and  the 
Persians  fell  back  to  their  camp.  Here  another  struggle  took 
place;  but  the  Athenians  now  came  up  to  the  help  of  the 
Spartans,  and  the  Greek  victory  was  complete. 

All  the  precious  vessels  of  gold  and  silver  which  Xerxes  had 
been  too  hurried  to  take  away,  and  so  had  left  to  his  officers, 
now  fell  to  the  Greeks,  and  in  some  degree  repaid  them  for 
the  immense  expenses  of  the  war.  It  is  said  that  only  three 
thousand  Persians  were  left  alive  out  of  the  three  hundred 
thousand  of  Mardonius's  great  army,  while  in  all  only  one 
hundred  and  sixty  Greeks  died  on  the  field. 

On  the  afternoon  of  the  day  in  which  the  battle  of  Plateea 
was  fought  in  the  morning,  the  Greeks  won  another  great 
victory  over  the  Persians  at  Mycale  in  Asia  Minor.  Here  it 
was  the  Athenians  who  played  the  chief  part,  going  to  the 
help  of  the  Greek  cities  in  Asia  Minor,  who  were  still  under 
the  hated  rule  of  the  Great  King.  The  Persian  admiral  drew 
up  his  boats  on  the  shore,  but  the  Athenians  followed,  landed, 
and  fought  against  them  on  land,  and  won  a  great  victory. 
So  not  only  were  the  Persians  driven  out  of  Greece  proper, 
and  Europe  saved  from  an  invasion  by  an  Eastern  people,  but 
the  Greeks  in  Asia  Minor  were  freed  from  their  rule ;  and  soon 
they  were  to  be  followed  into  their  own  strongholds,  and  the 
magnificence  of  the  Great  King  was  to  be  a  thing  of  the  past. 


CHAPTER   IV 

THE  ATHENS  OF  PERICLES  AND  SOCRATES 

Athens  had  very  nobly  allowed  the  Spartans  to  take  the 
lead  in  the  great  struggle  with  Persia,  but  once  the  danger 
was  past  the  old  jealousy  between  the  two  states  broke  out 
again.  Pausanias,  the  Spartan  leader,  who  had  fought  so 
bravely  and  won  so  glorious  a  victory  at  Plateea,  soon  proved 
himself  unworthy  of  the  position  he  held,  and  Athens  took 
advantage  of  this  to  place  an  Athenian  at  the  head  of  her 
fleet.  Pausanias  was  found  to  be  writing  to  the  Persians,  and 
even  planning  to  give  Greece  up  into  the  power  of  the  Great 
King,  if  he  himself  should  be  allowed  to  marry  the  king's 
daughter,  and  if  all  sorts  of  riches  were  showered  upon 
him. 

When  the  Spartans  sent  messages  to  the  Persians  through 
Pausanias  it  was  noticed  that  no  answer  ever  came,  and  so  a 
slave  who  was  given  a  letter  to  take,  opened  it  to  see  what  it 
said.  He  found  that  it  merely  told  the  Persians  to  kill  the 
messenger  (himself).  The  slave  took  the  letter  to  the  judges 
at  Sparta,  and  Pausanias,  who  had  already  been  called  back  to 
Sparta,  was  condemned  to  death.  He  fled  for  shelter  to  the 
Temple  of  Athene ;  and  as  it  was  not  considered  right  to  kill 
a  man  in  so  holy  a  place,  or  even  violently  to  drag  him  forth, 
the  Spartans  ordered  that  the  doors  of  the  temple  should  be 
blocked  up,  and  the  roof  taken  off",  so  that  Pausanias  soon 
died  a  miserable  death  through  cold  and  hunger. 

Meanwhile  the  Athenians  had  built  very  strong  walls  round 
their  city  and  round  their  port  at  the  Pirseus.  Now  with 
such  strong  walls  and  their  mighty  fleet  they  had  no  need  to 

46 


48  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

fear  anybody,  and  the  Spartans  were  surprised  and  angry  to 
find  that  the  new  leader  they  sent  to  Athens  in  place  of 
Pausanias  was  sent  back  with  the  message  that  the  Athenians 
had  chosen  a  leader  of  their  own. 

After  this  there  was  a  terrible  enmity  between  Sparta 
and  Athens.  Athens  was  now  quite  equal  in  wealth  and 
importance  to  Sparta,  and  she  took  steps  to  make  herself 
still  richer  and  more  powerful.  She  kept  up  an  immense 
navy,  and  many  of  the  islands  in  the  JEgesm  Sea,  Thrace, 
and  some  of  the  Greek  colonies  in  Asia  Minor  joined  in 
a  league  with  Athens.  They  were  all  to  send  ships  and 
sailors,  and  all  to  defend  each  other  against  any  enemy. 
The  League  was  called  the  Confederacy  of  Delos,  and  all 
the  money  belonging  to  it  was  kept  at  the  Temple  of  Apollo 
at  Delos,  and  each  state  sent  men  there  to  worship  the 
ffod.      But   in   time  Athens  often  allowed  the  other  states 

o 

to  send  money  instead  of  ships  ;  and  after  a  while  she  forgot 
that  the  other  states  had  joined  her  of  their  own  free  will, 
and  she  began  to  think  herself  the  chief  state  of  a  sort  of 
empire,  with  the  other  states  paying  tribute  to  her.  In  the 
end  this  was  very  bad  for  Athens,  for  it  made  the  other  states 
angry  and  ready  to  help  her  enemies  against  her. 

But  this  was  not  for  a  long  time  yet,  and  for  many  years 
Athens  grew  richer  and  richer.  She  kept  up  an  immense  navy  ; 
but  there  was  more  money  than  was  needed  for  that,  and  some 
of  this  was  spent  on  raising  beautiful  buildings  in  Athens 
and  making  life  very  easy  for  her  people.  Even  the  men  who 
met  in  their  parliament  to  rule  the  state  were  paid  for  their 
time  and  trouble.  The  Athenians  became  great  traders,  and 
sent  their  merchant-ships  to  all  parts  of  Greece.  Gold  and 
silver  were  quite  common. 

But  the  Athenians  were  not  like  the  Persians,  who  wasted 
their  wealth  on  mere  splendour  and  show.  Nor  had  they  any 
sympathy  with  the  Spartans,  who,  however  rich  they  might 
be,  would  never  change  from  their  plain,  hard  way  of  living. 
The  Athenians  loved  beautiful  things,  and  they  spent  their 


THE  ATHENS  OF  PERICLES  AND  SOCRATES     49 


money  in  making  their  city  perfect  and  in  giving  joy  and 
pleasure  to  all  the  citizens. 

Pericles 

The  chief  man  in  democratic  Athens  for  many  years  after 
the  Persian  Wars  was  Pericles,  one  of  the  most  famous  men 
who  have  ever  lived.  He  never 
trusted  Sparta,  and  knew  that 
a  great  struggle  with  that  state 
must  come  some  day.  He  was 
made  '  general '  of  the  Athenian 
people  ;  but  he  was  always  care- 
ful to  remember  that  he  held 
power  from  the  people,  who 
chose  him  to  rule  as  their  best 
and  wisest  citizen.  Unlike  so 
many  of  even  the  bravest  Greeks, 
he  was  faithful  and  honest  in 
small  things  as  well  as  great. 
He  was  kind,  too,  and  on  his 
deathbed,  when  the  men  round 
him  were  talking  of  the  great 
and  noble  things  he  had  done, 
he  reminded  them  that  he  was  to 
be  praised  not  for  these  things, 
but  because  he  had  never  caused 
sorrow  to  a  fellow-citizen.  This 
was  remarkable  at  a  time  when 

the  Greeks  were  terribly  cruel  and  revengeful  to  any  one  who 
offended  them. 

Yet  Pericles  had  done  wonderful  things,  for  which  his 
fellow- citizens  might  justly  praise  him.  It  was  said  that  '  he 
found  Athens  of  brick  and  left  it  of  marble.'  The  whole  city 
had  practically  to  be  built  again  after  the  Persian  attack.  A 
giant  statue  of  the  Goddess  Athene  made  of  bronze  was  made 
and  placed  on  the  highest  point  of  the  Acropolis.     Then  the 

D 


SOUL-ENTRANCING    PERICLES 


(From  a  bust  in  the  British  Museum). 


50  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

Athenians  planned  and  built  the  Parthenon,  a  beautiful 
temple  of  marble,  the  ruins  of  which  remain  to-day  to  show 
men  how  beautiful  the  buildings  of  Greece  could  be. 

Right  round  the  outside  of  the  temple  ran  a  frieze  or  band 
of  sculpture,  carved  by  Phidias,  perhaps  the  greatest  sculptor 


THE    GREEK    IDEAL 

This  beautiful  sculptuie,  a  portion  of  the  frieze  of  the  Parthenon  now  in  the  Louvre, 
represents,  as  only  a  Greek  artist  could,  the  bodily  perfection  towards  which  the 

Athenians  strove. 

who  has  ever  lived,  and  by  his  pupils.  Bits  of  this  frieze  have 
since  been  carried  off  by  other  nations.  Some  may  be  seen 
in  the  British  Museum  in  London,  and  others  in  the  Museum 
of  the  Louvre  in  Paris.  They  are  considered  among  our 
greatest  treasures  of  art.  Inside  the  temple  was  another 
immense  figure  of  Athene,  carved  by  Phidias  himself  from 


^.'n  M 


THE    PARTHENON    AND    THE    ACROPOLIS    OF    ATHENS    AS    THEY    PROBABLY    WERE 

IN    THE    DAYS    OF    PERICLES. 

(From  a  reconstruction  in  the  British  Museum.) 


THE  PARTHENON  OF  ATHENS  AS  IT  IS  TO-DAY. 

(From  a  photograph  by  Alinari.) 


THE  ATHENS  OF  PERICLES  AND  SOCRATES     51 


'O' 


ivory  and  gold,  as  marble  was  not  considered  rich  enough. 
The  great  public  buildings  were  adorned  with  pictures  telling 
of  the  legends  of  early  Greece  and  of  the  wars  of  later  times. 
A  great  theatre,  too,  was  built.  It  was  a  fine  building-,  and  had 
no  roof,  so  that  the  Athenians  with 
their  fine  climate  could  see  plays  acted 
in  perfect  comfort. 

Just  as  the  age  of  Pericles  was  the 
time  when  the  greatest  artists  of 
Athens  lived,  so,  too,  it  was  the  age  of 
the  great  Athenian  play- writers.  It 
seemed  as  though  the  joy  of  victory 
over  the  Persians  had  spread  through 
the  nation  and  inspired  the  cleverest 
men  in  the  most  wonderful  way.  This 
kind  of  thing  has  often  been  noticed  in 
the  history  of  nations.  A  nation  will 
grow  strong  and  fight  for  its  freedom, 
and  it  will  be  found  that  the  age  of 
great  soldiers  will  be  also  the  age  of 
great  poets. 

The  first  of  the  great  play-writers 
of  Greece  was  ^schylus,  and  he  fought 
with  all  his  strength  at  Marathon.  In 
the  age  of  Pericles  lived  two  other 
ffreat    tragic    play  -  writers,   Sophocles  and  gold  by  PMdias.  The  original 

1    -n        •     •  1  1       1      •  1  1  ^^^  ^^^S  been  lost). 

and  Euripides,  and  their  plays,  which 

students  read  to-day  with  the  greatest  admiration,  were 
then  played  before  the  Athenian  people  in  their  beautiful 
open-air  theatre;  and  the  people  wept  over  them  and 
gained  new  ideas  from  them,  and  went  away  full  of  joy 
and  wonder  at  the  beautiful  things  they  had  seen  and  heard. 
Sophocles  had  been  a  boy,  of  sixteen  at  the  time  of  the 
battle  of  Salamis,  and  he  was  chosen,  because  he  was  so 
beautiful  and  could  play  so  well  on  the  lyre,  to  lead  the  chorus 
of  boys  who  took  part  in  the  thanksgiving  ceremonies  on  the 


THE    FIGURE    OF    ATHENE    OF 
THE    PARTHENON 

(From    a     Roman    copy    of    the 
immense    statue   carved   in  ivory 


52  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

island  of  Salamis  to  celebrate  the  victory.  Then,  too,  there 
was  Aristophanes,  a  writer  of  comedies  which  made  people 
laugh  instead  of  weep. 

Socrates 

The  age  of  Pericles  was  the  time,  too,  when  the  great 
Greek  thinkers  and  philosophers  gave  their  teaching  to 
the  world.  The  first  great  Greek  philosopher  was  Socrates. 
The  most  educated  of  the  Greeks  had  begun  to  ask  questions 
about  the  real  meaning  of  the  world  and  the  things  around 
them,  but  Socrates  was  the  first  who  gave  any  real  answer. 
He  understood  that  the  tales  about  the  gods  of  Greece  and  of 
the  other  nations  could  not  be  true,  and  that  there  could  only 
be  one  God.  He  might  have  been  seen  any  day  in  the  streets 
of  Athens  asking  questions  of  boys  and  young  men,  who 
crowded  round  him  to  listen  to  his  wise  answers.  When  they 
gave  foolish  or  thoughtless  answers  he  laughed,  and  showed 
how  necessary  it  is  to  think  before  we  speak. 

Socrates  was  a  little  ugly  man  with  a  flat,  snub  nose,  but 
he  was  a  very  noble  character.  He  would  talk  to  any  man 
he  met,  workmen  as  well  as  scholars,  and  he  longed  to  help 
men  to  be  good  and  truthful.  He  loved  the  town  with  its 
crowds  and  liveliness,  and  many  of  the  people  loved  him. 
He  dressed  always  in  the  poorest  clothes  and  ate  the  simplest 
food,  for  he  thought  that  these  things  did  not  matter.  He 
cared  only  for  knowledge  and  goodness.  In  the  end  he  had 
a  very  sad  death. 

Some  of  the  people  at  whom  he  had  laughed  were  very 
angry  with  him.  Others  thought  that  it  was  very  dangerous 
that  their  young  men  should  be  told  that  the  old  tales  about 
the  gods  were  not  true.  After  the  death  of  Pericles  the 
Athenians,  spoilt  by  success,  had  grown  very  changeable  and 
restless.  Socrates  irritated  them  by  insisting  that  goodness 
consisted  in  doing  right,  and  that  offerings  to  the  gods  were 
of  no  use  without  this.  Thirty  years  after  the  death  of 
Pericles,  Socrates,  now  seventy  years  of  age,  was  called  before 


THE  ATHENS  OF  PERICLES  AND  SOCRATES     53 


the  judges,  and  put  on  trial  for  offences  against  the  gods  and 
the  state.  He  was  condemned  to  die,  but  did  not  seem  in 
the  least  afraid.  He  even  vexed  the  judges  by  joking  on  the 
subject.  When  they  asked  him  to  suggest  w^hat  else  the 
Athenians  might  do  to  him  instead  of  putting  him  to  death, 
he  suggested  that  they  should  keep  him  in  a  certain  hall  in 
Athens,  where  men  who  had  served  the  state  were  kept  at 
the  expense  of  the  state.  The 
judges  indignantly  passed  sent- 
ence of  death  on  the  old  philo- 
sopher, and  he  spent  some  time 
in  prison  before  the  time  ap- 
pointed for  his  death. 

One  of  his  followers  told 
Socrates  how  sad  he  was  because 
he  was  being  put  to  death  with- 
out deserving  it.  But  Socrates 
replied,  smiling,  that  it  would 
have  been  much  worse  if  he  had 
deserved  it.  He  declared  that  no 
real  harm  could  happen  to  a  good 
man  in  this  life  or  the  next.  The 
Greeks  used  to  give  poison  to  a 
condemned  man,  and  allow  him 
to  drink  it  himself  at  any  moment 
he  might  choose.    Socrates  drank 

the  hemlock  with  his  friends  around  him,  and  when  they 
broke  out  in  cries  and  tears  he  begged  them  to  be  quiet 
and  allow  him  to  die  in  peace. 

It  was  not  many  years  before  the  Athenians  were  very  sorry 
indeed  for  the  way  Socrates  had  been  treated,  and  those  who 
had  caused  his  death  were  punished.  The  death  of  Socrates 
came  when  Athens  had  fallen  far  from  her  greatness  in  the 
days  of  Pericles.  In  the  days  of  Pericles  he  was  still  held 
in  great  honour. 

It  was  in  wars  against  the  other  states  of  Greece  that 


n^jpipiniiiinii  niniTiW^ 


SOCRATES^    THE    FIRST    GREAT    GREEK 
PHILOSOPHER 

(From  a  bust  in  the  Naples  Museum). 


54  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

Athens  lost  her  riches  and  her  power.  Pericles  knew  that  a 
struggle  with  Sparta  must  come,  and  he  did  all  he  could  to 
strengthen  Athens  for  the  fight.  He  built  the  famous  '  Long 
Walls '  from  Athens  down  to  the  sea,  reaching  the  coast  at  the 
Pirseus,  the  port  of  Athens.  No  better  plan  could  have  been 
made  for  the  safety  of  Athens.  It  would  for  the  future  be  of 
little  use  for  Sparta  or  any  other  state  to  besiege  her  by  land, 
for  food  could  always  be  brought  in  ships  to  the  port,  and  then 
carried  between  the  two  Long  Walls  into  the  city.  Twice  in 
the  early  years  of  Pericles'  rule  Sparta  had  taken  arms  against 
Athens,  but  peace  had  been  made. 

It  was  not  until  two  years  before  his  death  that  the  famous 
war  between  Sparta  and  Athens,  known  as  the  Peloponnesian 
W^ar,  broke  out.  The  policy  of  Pericles  had  prepared  Athens 
for  the  struggle,  but  she  was  weakened  by  jealousies  among 
the  members  of  the  Confederacy  of  Delos,  whom  she  had 
treated  so  proudly  and  so  unjustly.  Other  causes  helped  to 
make  Sparta  win  ;  and  the  later  history  of  Athens,  in  its  sad- 
ness and  gloom,  serves  to  throw  into  contrast  her  wonderful 
activity  and  prosperity  in  the  age  of  Pericles. 


CHAPTER  V 

THE  GREEK  COLONIES  IN  THE  WEST 

Before  continuing  the  history  of  the  Greeks  in  Greece 
proper,  it  will  be  well  to  take  a  glance  at  what  was 
happening  to  the  Greek  colonies  farther  west.  It  will  be 
remembered  that  about  the  same  time  that  Greeks  had  gone 
forth  from  Greece  proper  to  make  settlements  on  the  coast 
of  Asia  Minor,  others  had  sailed  westward  and  made 
colonies  in  Sicily  and  the  south  of  Italy.  The  Greeks  loved 
to  live  in  cities,  and  when  possible  near  the  sea,  and  so  most 
of  these  towns  were  on  the  coast.  Sicily  and  Southern  Italy 
became  known  as  Greater  Greece,  and  the  settlers  never  for- 
got that  they  were  Greeks.  They  set  up  temples  to  the 
gods  of  their  country,  and  lived  much  as  they  had  done  at 
home. 

Some  of  these  Greek  colonies  in  Greater  Greece  were 
much  richer  than  the  Greek  cities  at  home.  So  luxurious 
were  the  people  of  Sybaris,  a  town  in  South  Italy,  that  even 
to-day  we  call  a  person  who  loves  pleasure  more  than  any- 
thing else  a  'Sybarite.'  A  colony  which  went  out  from 
Sybaris  itself  was  called  Croton,  and  became  famous  for  its 
clever  doctors.  Pythagoras,  a  famous  philosopher,  belonged 
to  Croton.  The  Sybarites  and  Crotonians  always  hated  each 
other,  and  finally  the  Crotonians  destroyed  Sybaris  com- 
pletely in  war  ;  for  these  Greek  states  abroad  were  like  those 
at  home,  always  fighting  with  each  other.  Another  colony 
famous  for  its  luxury,  although  it  was  founded  by  men  from 
Sparta,  who  must  have  been  brought  up  in  the  strictest  way, 
was  Tarentum,  on  the  gulf  of  the  same  name. 


56 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


There  were  many  Greek  settlements  in  Sicily,  the  chief 
being  Syracuse,  founded  by  people  from  Corinth.  Another 
great  Greek  settlement  in  Sicily  was  Agrigentum,  which  is 
remembered  by  its  tyrant,  Phalaris.  He  was  a  tyrant  in  our 
sense  of  the  word  as  well  as  the  Greek.  He  is  said  to  have 
burnt  his  enemies  alive  inside  a  bull  made  of  brass.     After 


THE    TEMPLE    OF    THE    GREEK    COLONY    AT    AGRIGENTUM    IN    SICILY 

Wherever  the  Greeks  settled  they  always  erected  temples,  generally  like  the  beautiful  one  of 
which  the  ruins  are  shown  in  this  picture. 


some  years  the  people  turned  on  him,  and  put  him  to  death 
with  terrible  torture. 

The  Greeks  in  Sicily  and  Italy  had  changes  of  government 
very  like  the  states  in  Greece  proper.  Some  became  aristo- 
cracies, some  democracies,  but  they  always  remained  city 
states,  and  were  too  jealous  of  one  another  ever  to  unite 
under  one  government.  The  people  of  Agrigentum  built 
tennples  almost  as  beautiful  as  those  of  Athens,  and  their 
ruins  are  still  to  be  seen. 

The  most  westerly  of  all  the  Greek  settlements  was 
Marsilia,  in  the  south  of  France,  now  called  Marseilles. 


THE  GREEK  COLONIES  IN  THE  WEST      57 

The  Struggle  with  Carthage 

It  was  a  curious  fact  that  at  the  same  time  that  Greece 
proper  was  engaged  in  its  life-and-death  struggle  with  Persia, 
the  Greeks  of  the  west  were  also  threatened  by  a  great 
power.  This  was  Carthage,  a  settlement  made  on  the  north 
of  Africa  long  before  by  the  Phoenicians  in  the  days  of  their 
greatness.  Phoenicia  had  long  ceased  to  be  a  great  power 
but  Carthage  had  grown  rich,  and  had  herself  sent  out 
colonies.  She  had  also  won  for  herself  much  land  along  the 
north  of  Africa,  partly  consisting  of  other  smaller  Phoenician 
settlements,  and  partly  to  the  native  people,  called  the 
Libyans,  with  whom  the  Carthaginians  mixed  freely.  The 
Libyans,  however,  had  no  part  in  the  government,  which  was, 
in  fact,  in  the  hands  of  a  few  Carthaginian  nobles.  It  was  an 
aristocracy  of  the  narrowest  sort.  The  Carthaginians  were 
rich  and  fond  of  pleasure,  though  the  men  who  were  actually 
ruling  the  state  at  any  time  lived  plainly,  and  would  not 
touch  wine,  thinking  that  a  ruler  should  keep  his  brain  clear 
and  his  wits  sharp. 

The  Greeks  and  Carthaginians  in  the  Western  Mediter- 
ranean soon  became  very  jealous  of  each  other.  There  was  a 
third  state,  higher  up  in  Italy,  Rome,  which  in  the  end  was  to 
conquer  both,  but  her  turn  had  not  yet  come.  There  were 
many  small  fights  between  the  Carthaginians  and  Greeks, 
especially  in  Sicily,  in  the  west  of  which  the  Carthaginians 
had  made  several  settlements.  The  Greeks  tried  in  the  early 
part  of  the  fifth  century  B.C.  to  push  the  Carthaginians  out  of 
Sicily  altogether,  but  they  did  not  manage  it ;  and  the  Cartha- 
ginians in  their  turn  chose  the  time  when  Xerxes  was  attacking 
Greece  proper  to  make  a  determined  attack  on  the  Greeks 
in  Sicily.  They  chose  this  time  because  they  were  afraid  that 
otherwise  the  Greeks  at  home  would  come  to  the  help  of  their 
colonies. 

The  Carthaginians  made  up  their  minds  to  send  a 
great  army,  under    Hamilcar,   a   brave   soldier,  who   was  a 


58  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

Carthaginian  on  his  father's  side  and  a  Syracusan  Greek 
on  his  mother's.  Under  his  command  were  three  thousand 
ships  carrying  an  enormous  army.  It  was  an  army  much  like 
that  of  Xerxes,  awkward  and  unwieldy,  too  large  because  of 
the  different  peoples  which  went  to  make  it  up.  There  were 
Carthaginians  and  men  from  their  colonies,  the  native 
I^ibyans,  and  some  Greeks  from  states  which  were  enemies 
of  Himera,  and  the  other  Greek  states  of  Sicily  which  were 
to  be  attacked.  A  storm  destroyed  many  of  the  ships  on 
their  way  across  to  Panormus  (now  Palermo),  where  Hamilcar 
landed  his  men  and  marched  on  Himera. 

A  great  battle  was  fought,  which  the  Greeks  won,  partly  by  a 
clever  trick  and  partly  by  their  better  fighting.  It  was  said  that 
a  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  men  of  the  army  of  Carthage  lay 
dead  upon  the  field.  Hamilcar  watched  the  fight  all  day,  burn- 
ing a  great  fire  of  sacrifice  to  his  gods,  which  may  have  been 
a  sacrifice  of  human  beings,  for  the  Carthaginians  had  this 
dreadful  practice.  At  sunset,  seeing  that  defeat  was  certain, 
he  threw  himself  into  the  fire  and  died,  rather  than  return 
home  to  tell  of  his  misfortune.  All  of  the  ships  which  had 
been  drawn  up  upon  the  beach  were  burnt  by  the  Greeks, 
and  of  the  twenty  which  had  not  been  drawn  up,  and  so  sailed 
away,  only  one  returned  to  Carthage  to  tell  the  sad  tale ;  for 
again  a  storm  rose,  and  the  others  were  destroyed. 

The  Greeks  raised  a  monument  in  honour  of  Hamilcar, 
although  he  was  their  enemy,  and  the  Carthaginians,  although 
they  were  not  usually  grateful  to  their  heroes,  honoured  his 
memory  for  many  years. 

The  soldiers  who  remained  aliv^e  out  of  the  army  of 
Carthage  were  made  slaves  by  the  people  of  Agi'igentum. 

It  was  afterwards  told  that  the  battle  of  Himera  was 
fought  on  the  same  day  as  the  great  sea-fight  of  Salamis. 
It  was  at  any  rate  about  the  same  time,  and  so  the  Greeks 
triumphed  against  their  enemies  in  both  east  and  west. 

For  seventy  years  after  the  battle  of  Himera  the  Cartha- 
ginians left  the  Greeks  alone.     If  they  had  won  Sicily,  the 


THE  GREEK  COLONIES  IN  THE  WEST      59 

Carthaginians  might  have  won  the  south  of  Italy  too.  As  it 
was,  time  was  given  for  Rome  to  grow  and  extend  its  power 
there.  The  Greeks  and  Carthaginains  were  to  have  many  a 
desperate  struggle  yet  in  Sicily  ;  but  by  that  time  the  Greek 
power  had  become  as  nothing  compared  to  that  of  Rome,  and 
it  was  to  Rome  that  the  fall  of  Carthage  was  in  the  end  due. 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE  PELOPONNESIAN  WAR 

The  history  of  this  war,  which  lasted  with  periods  of  peace 
nearly  thirty  years,  is  perhaps  of  more  importance  in  the 
history  of  Greece  than  in  the  history  of  the  world.  In  it  the 
power  and  greatness  of  Athens  were  brought  to  an  end.  It 
is  just  possible  but  not  probable  that  if  Athens  had  won 
she  would  have  conquered  the  rest  of  Greece,  and  a  great 
Athenian  empire  might  have  been  formed.  If  this  had  been 
so,  Athens  would  have  had  an  even  greater  influence  on  later 
history  than  she  has  had.  But  it  was  not  to  be,  and  there  is 
no  real  reason  to  believe  that  Athens,  even  if  she  had  been 
victorious,  would  have  set  up  such  an  empire.  Still,  the  story 
of  the  war  is  interesting  and  important. 

Ever  since  the  Persian  War,  and  especially  under  the  rule  of 
Pericles,  Athens  had  irritated  the  other  Greek  states.  She  had 
made  conquests  on  land,  but  these  had  been  soon  taken  from 
her.  But  she  clung  to  her  empire,  for  such  the  Confederacy  of 
Delos  had  become.  The  Persian  power  no  longer  threatened 
Greece,  and  had  definitely  set  free  even  the  Greek  colonies 
in  Asia  Minor,  but  still  Athens  collected  contributions  from 
all  the  islands  in  the  ^gean.  The  money  was  no  longer  kept 
at  Delos,  but  was  sent  to  Athens,  and  much  of  it  was  spent 
on  the  buildings  there  and  on  the  amusement  of  the  people. 

Athens  interfered  also  in  the  government  of  the  other 
states  of  the  confederacy  whenever  trouble  arose,  and  set  up 
democratic  governments  like  their  own.  All  important  law 
cases  had  to  be  heard  in  Athens.  When  Samos,  a  large 
island  which  clung  to  its  independence,  refused  to  allow  its 


THE  PELOPONNESIAN  WAK  61 

quarrel  with  Miletus  to  be  settled  by  Athens,  the  Athenians 
attacked  her,  destroyed  all  her  walls  of  defence,  took  away 
her  fleet,  and  made  her  pay  the  costs  of  the  war.  The 
Athenians  kept  sixty  boats  always  in  the  ^gean  Sea,  as 
though  she  was  afraid  of  a  rebellion.  For  years  a  great 
struggle  between  Sparta  and  Athens  had  been  expected. 
With  Sparta  necessarily  went  the  whole  of  the  Peloponnesian 
League,  of  which  she  was  the  chief  member.  The  third 
greatest  state  in  Greece  was  Corinth,  which  was  a  sea-power 
nearly  as  strong  as  Athens. 

It  was  with  Corinth  that  Athens  first  quarrelled,  but  Sparta 
took  the  opportunity  of  calling  a  meeting  to  discuss  a  war  with 
Athens.  Messages  were  sent  threatening  war  if  the  Athenians 
would  not  send  Pericles  away.  This,  of  course,  they  would  not 
do  ;  but  they  might  have  sent  peaceful  messages  back  but  for  a 
speech  which  Pericles  himself  made  to  the  people.  He  was  a 
great  speaker,  and  when  he  pointed  out  that  the  war  was  sure 
to  come  some  day,  and  that  the  Athenians  were  quite  strong 
enough  to  face  their  enemies,  they  made  up  their  minds  to 
fight,  and  to  fight  as  Pericles  should  tell  them. 

So  in  the  year  431  b.c.  the  great  struggle  between  the  two 
greatest  states  in  Greece  began.  On  the  side  of  the  Spartans 
were  nearly  all  the  Greeks  of  the  peninsula,  though  Sparta's 
old  enemy,  Argos  in  the  Peloponnesus,  refused  to  join,  and 
Platasa,  the  faithful  little  ally  of  Athens,  fought  once  more 
on  her  side.  The  war  began  with  an  attack  on  Platasa  by 
the  people  of  Thebes.  Three  hundred  Thebans  got  into 
Plateea,  and  kept  the  people  shut  up  in  their  houses.  But 
the  Platseans  broke  down  the  inside  walls  of  their  houses, 
and  so  were  able  to  talk  to  each  other.  They  arranged  an 
attack  on  the  Thebans,  and  a  terrible  fight  took  place.  The 
Platseans  killed  many  Thebans,  and  many  others  were  driven 
into  a  large  building  where,  grain  was  kept.  Other  Thebans 
came  up  to  the  walls  to  help  them ;  but  the  Plateeans  got 
them  to  go  away,  and  then,  in  spite  of  their  promises,  killed 
every  Theban  left  in  the  town.     So  angry  were  the  people 


62 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


of  Thebes  that  they  sent  another  great  army  to  attack 
Platfcea,  and  tlie  Athenians,  although  they  were  vexed  that 
the  Plataeans  had  broken  their  word,  had  to  send  an  army  to 
protect  them  from  the  Thebans. 

Then  the  Spartans  marched  into  Attica  itself.  Pericles 
thought  that  the  Athenians  would  have  little  chance  on  land 
against  the  great  army  of  Sparta,  so  he  collected  all  the 
people  of  Attica  within  the  I-.ong  Walls,  for  he  knew  that 
they  could  get  plenty  of  food  by  sea. 

The  people  of  Attica  hated  to  leave  their  farms  and  vine- 


TVVO    GKEEK    SOLDIERS    OK    THE    FIFTH    CENTURV    B.C. 

(From  an  ancient  vaae  painting  rei)resenting  the  fight  of  Achilles  and  Agamemnon,  whose 
names  are  written  in  Greek  beside  each  figure). 


yards  to  be  destroyed  by  the  enemy,  but  there  was  nothing  else 
to  do.  The  cattle  were  sent  to  the  island  of  Eubcjea,  and  the 
people  lived  in  huts  and  tents  put  up  in  haste  in  the  empty  space 
between  the  Long  Walls.  Then  Pericles  sent  ships  round  to 
harass  the  people  on  the  coasts  of  the  Peloponnesus.  The 
great  Spartan  army,  once  it  had  laid  waste  all  the  country 
round  Athens,  could  do  nothing  more  to  harm  the  Athenians. 
Only  a  few  bands  of  horsemen  went  out  to  hamper  them.  So 
the  first  year  of  the  war  ended.  There  was  a  great  funeral 
service  in  memory  of  those  who  had  been  killed;  and  Pericles 
made  a  noble  speech,  assuring  the  Athenians  that  the  severity 
of  Sparta  could  never  make  men  so  noble  as  the  freedom  of 


THE  PELOPONNESIAN  WAR  63 

Athens,  and  begging  them  not  to  grieve  too  much  over  the 
dead,  but  to  be  ready  to  die  in  their  turn  if  need  were. 

The  next  year  things  happened  in  much  the  same  way. 
In  the  spring  (for  ancient  peoples  never  fought  in  the  winter) 
a  great  Spartan  army  ravaged  Attica  again.  The  people  of 
the  countryside  again  took  refuge  between  the  Long  Walls ; 
but  a  terrible  misfortune  fell  upon  the  Athenians.  A  dreadful 
sickness  called  the  plague  broke  out  in  the  Piraeus.  It  came 
to  Europe  from  the  East,  and  had  broken  out  in  Egypt  and 
also  in  Italy.  It  must  have  been  brought  by  some  ship  to 
the  Piraeus,  and  it  spread  quickly  among  the  people  crowded 
unhealthily  together  between  the  Long  Walls.  The  people 
suffered  terribly,  and  hundreds  died,  without  any  one  to  bury 
them.     Pericles  himself  fell  ill,  but  got  better. 

On  all  sides  people  began  to  grumble  against  him,  as 
though  their  misfortunes  were  through  his  fault.  A  leather- 
seller  called  Cleon,  a  vulgar  and  ignorant  man,  tried  to  have 
the  rule  of  Athens  taken  from  him,  but  Pericles  kept  it  till 
his  death,  which  came  shortly  afterwards. 

In  the  next  year  the  Spartans  took  revenge  on  the  little 
city  of  Platsea.  All  its  men  were  killed,  its  women  and 
children  sold  as  slaves,  and  the  city  itself  destroyed. 

After  the  death  of  Pericles  power  in  Athens  fell  to  Cleon 
the  leather-seller.  He  was  very  violent,  and  determined  to 
remain  at  war,  although  many  in  Athens  would  have  wished 
for  peace.  Just  after  his  death,  and  after  ten  years  of  cruel 
and  foolish  warfare,  a  peace  was  at  last  made  between  Sparta 
and  Athens.  It  lasted  seven  years,  though  it  was  made  for 
fifty.  Life  in  Athens  had  quite  changed,  and  so  had  the 
spirit  of  the  people.  Socrates  was  still  there,  a  relic  of  the 
great  age  of  Pericles,  but  the  new  generation  was  changeable 
and  fickle. 

Alcibiades 

Even  when  the  fifty  years'  peace  was  signed,  the  best- 
known  man  in  Athens  was  Alcibiades,  a  man  thirty  years  old. 


64 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


His  wayward  character,  his  cleverness  and  courage,  and  his 
faults  seem  to  be  signs  of  the  change  which  had  come  upon 
the  Athenians.  Alcibiades  was  a  young  relation  of  Pericles, 
and  he  was  a  pupil  of  Socrates,  but  he  was  not  wise  and 
serious  like  them.  Knowing,  as  did  Socrates,  that  the  belief 
in  the  gods  was  not  true,  he  merely  laughed  at  them,  whereas 
Socrates  had  taught  men  to  look  to  higher  things  than  these, 
and  to  do  good  even  if  they  no  longer  honoured  the  gods. 
Alcibiades  was  what  is  called  irresponsible.     He  would  do 

anything  which  came  into  his  head 
at  any  moment.  He  often  drank 
too  much  wine,  and  went  noisily 
about  the  town  with  his  companions. 
Yet  it  was  to  such  a  man  as  this 
that  the  Athenians  now  gave  their 
trust.  They  mistook  cleverness  for 
wisdom. 

At  the  first  Olympic  games  after 
the  fifty  years'  peace  was  signed,  it 
was  thought  that  Athens  would  not 
be  able  to  send  any  people  to  take 
part.  But  Alcibiades  was  there 
offering  sacrifices  in  beautiful  golden 
bowls,  and  with  seven  four-horsed 
chariots  to  run  in  the  races.  Twice 
he  was  crowned  as  victor  with  the 
All  the  time  Alcibiades  was  anxious 
that  Athens  should  fight  again  with  Sparta,  and  war  did  in 
fact  soon  break  out  again. 

The  Athenians  at  this  time  showed  the  greatest  cruelty 
towards  any  member  of  the  Confederacy  of  Delos  which  dared 
to  rebel  against  her  unjust  empire.  The  Island  of  Melos,  which 
rebelled,  was  conquered,  and  every  man  there  was  put  to 
death,  the  women  and  children  being  sold  into  slavery. 

Shortly  after  this  the  Athenians  were  induced  by  Alcibiades 
to  send  a  great  fleet  and  army  to  Sicily,  where  the  colonies  of 


THE    WAYWARD    ALCIBIADES 


(From  a  bust  in  the  Louvre). 


crown  of  wild  olive. 


THE  PELOPONNESIAN  WAR  65 

Sparta  were  at  war  with  other  states.  The  Athenian 
expedition  went  to  help  a  city  called  Egesta  against  another 
called  Selinus.  The  people  of  Egesta  had  promised  to  pay 
the  expenses  of  the  expedition,  and  Alcibiades  had  persuaded 
the  Athenians  to  agree.  Nicias,  another  statesman  in  Athens, 
persuaded  the  people  to  send  messengers  to  see  if  the  people 
of  Egesta  were  really  as  rich  as  they  said.  It  was  said  after- 
wards that  they  showed  the  Athenian  messengers  plates 
and  cups  which  were  only  gilded  over,  and  pretended  they 
were  made  of  gold.  The  Athenians  were  deceived,  and  the 
expedition  went  off  under  Nicias  and  Alcibiades. 

But  the  morning  it  sailed,  the  Athenians  were  shocked  to 
find  that  all  the  busts  of  their  god  Hermes,  which  stood  on 
little  square  pedestals  at  the  street  corners,  had  been  thrown 
over  and  broken  during  the  night.  They  came  to  the  conclu- 
sion that  this  had  been  done  by  Alcibiades  as  a  joke.  It  was 
nothing  to  him,  because  he  did  not  believe  in  the  gods,  but  to 
those  who  did  it  seemed  a  terrible  sacrilege.  Afterwards  it 
was  thought  that  perhaps  Alcibiades  had  not  done  this  thing 
after  all,  but  he  had  done  worse  things  against  the  gods. 
So  messengers  were  sent  after  him  to  bring  him  back  a 
prisoner  in  his  own  ship,  but  instead  he  sailed  away  to 
Sparta,  and  offered  his  services  to  the  bitter  enemy  of  his 
country. 

The  Sicilian  expedition  was  a  complete  failure,  for  Alci- 
biades told  to  the  Spartans  all  the  plans  of  the  Athenians, 
and  persuaded  them  to  send  an  army  to  fight  against  the 
Athenians  in  Sicily.  He  was  full  of  anger  against  the  men 
of  his  own  state,  and  when  he  heard  that  sentence  of  death 
had  been  passed  upon  him,  he  declared, '  I  will  show  them  one 
day  that  I  am  still  alive.' 

The  leadership  of  the  Athenians  in  Sicily  was  left  to 
Nicias,  who  had  very  little  heart  for  it.  Alcibiades  had 
wished  all  the  other  Greek  colonies  in  Sicily  to  join  with 
the  Athenians  in  an  attack  on  the  Spartan  colonies, 
especially    Syracuse,   but   most    of  them   reftised,  and    the 

E 


66  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

Athenians  were  left  practically  alone.  A  great  battle  was 
fought  in  the  immense  harbour  at  Syracuse.  The  Athenians 
had  many  more  ships  than  the  Syracusans,  but  the  Syracusans 
had  placed  theirs  right  across  the  mouth  of  the  harbour,  and 
the  two  hundred  Athenian  ships  were  hemmed  in.  All  but 
sixty  were  destroyed,  and  the  men  who  could  escape  joined 
the  Athenian  army  on  the  shore.  Nicias  saw  that  they  must 
give  up  the  ships  and  try  to  escape  by  land  to  a  part  of  the 
island  where  the  people  were  friendly. 

It  was  a  terrible  march,  and  the  sick  and  wounded  had 
to  be  left  to  die.  Nicias,  who  had  hated  the  whole  thing, 
now  showed  how  brave  he  was.  Although  he  was  very 
ill  and  tired,  he  went  about  among  the  men  trying  to 
cheer  them.  At  one  place  the  army  had  to  march  through 
a  narrow  pass  between  high  rocks  which  the  Syracusans 
fortified.  For  two  days  the  Athenians  fought,  and  then  had 
to  give  up  and  choose  another  direction.  They  were  short  of 
food  and  water.  At  another  place  they  caught  sight  of  a  river 
flowing  in  a  deep  hollow,  and  they  were  so  thirsty  that  the 
whole  army  rushed  forward  to  drink.  Those  in  front  were 
pushed  down  into  the  water,  while  those  behind  fell  upon 
them,  and  were  either  crushed  or  pierced  by  the  spears  of  the 
fallen.  A  Spartan  army  fell  upon  them  while  they  were  in 
this  miserable  state. 

At  last  Nicias  gave  himself  up  with  his  army,  begging 
that  mercy  should  be  shown  to  the  ten  thousand  men 
who  remained  out  of  the  forty  thousand  who  had  begun 
this  terrible  march.  He  promised  that  the  Athenians 
would  pay  the  Syracusans  all  that  they  had  spent  on  the  war. 
But  the  same  cruelty  was  now  shown  as  has  been  noticed 
in  the  later  wars  in  Greece  proper.  The  Athenians  who 
thus  gave  themselves  up  were  put  in  stone  quarries,  and 
left  in  hunger  and  cold.  Nicias  and  the  other  Athenian 
leader,  Demosthenes,  were  to  be  put  to  death,  but  preferred 
to  kill  themselves. 

So  ended  in  miserable  defeat  this  expedition,  planned  in 


THE  PELOPONNESIAN  WAR  67 

all  light-heartedness  by  Alcibiades,  and  it  was  largely  he  who, 
by  helping  the  Spartans,  had  ruined  it.  Meanwhile  at  home 
Sparta  was  still  destroying  and  burning  in  the  Plain  of  Attica. 
The  Athenians  were  terribly  distressed  when  they  heard 
the  sad  fate  of  the  Sicilian  expedition.  The  loss  of  the  ships 
was  very  bad  for  their  navy,  but  they  bravely  set  to  work 
to  build  more.  But  the  struggle  was  too  severe.  Nearly  all 
the  members  of  the  Confederacy  of  Delos  rebelled,  and  all 
the  money  of  the  League,  so  long  stored  up  in  Athens,  was 
spent  in  fighting  them.  In  Athens  itself  the  people  had  not 
even  enough  food.  The  Persians  once  more  began  to  fight 
against  their  old  enemy  Athens,  and  joined  with  Sparta  in 
helping  the  revolt  of  the  Athenian  colonies  in  Asia  Minor. 
Alcibiades  had  helped  too  in  this  rebellion,  but  the  Spartans 
were  beginning  to  grow  tired  of  him.  He  had  deceived  one 
of  their  kings,  and  his  liveliness  of  character  prevented  them 
from  really  liking  him.  At  last  they  decided  that  he  should 
die,  but  Alcibiades  then  joined  the  friends  of  Athens,  and 
fought  against  the  colonies  whom  he  had  encouraged  to  rebel. 
In  the  end  he  won  several  battles,  and  then  went  back  to 
Athens,  was  forgiven,  and  even  welcomed.  His  manner  was 
as  attractive  to  the  Athenians  as  it  was  unpleasant  to  the 
Spartans,  and  all  his  terrible  treachery  was  forgotten. 

The  Ruin  of  Athens 

Alcibiades  was  a  fine  leader,  but  it  was  impossible  to  save 
Athens.  She  was  ruined  on  sea  and  on  land.  Alcibiades  was 
made  head  of  the  fleet,  but  he  left  it  for  a  time  under  another 
leader.  During  this  time  it  was  attacked  and  defeated  by 
the  Spartan  fleet,  which  was  now  bigger  than  that  of  Athens. 
Alcibiades  was  ordered  back  to  Athens  to  give  an  account  of 
his  conduct,  but  he  was  afraid  to  go,  and  fled  into  Thrace.  The 
Spartans  soon  afterwards  won  another  great  victory  at  sea, 
and  took  nearly  the  whole  of  the  Athenian  fleet  prisoner. 

Athens  now  gave  up  all  hope,  and  after  a  terrible  siege 
of  four  months  she  was  forced  to  give  in  to  Sparta,  who 


68  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

made  terribly  hard  conditions  for  peace.  The  Athenians 
had  to  destroy  the  long  walls  and  all  their  docks  and  their 
port  at  the  Pirseus.  They  were  to  keep  only  twelve  ships 
out  of  their  once  mighty  fleet.  They  were  not  to  attempt 
to  gain  power  again  over  the  members  of  the  Con- 
federacy of  Delos,  and  indeed  were  not  to  have  any 
possessions  outside  Attica.  They  must  help  Sparta  for  the 
future  against  all  her  enemies.  The  work  of  destruction  of 
the  long  walls  and  the  Pireeus  was  done  by  Spartan  work- 
men, to  the  sound  of  music  and  rejoicing,  and  with  every 
mark  of  insult  to  the  Athenians. 

So  ended  the  Peloponnesian  war,  which  had  made  Greece 
miserable  for  nearly  thirty  years.  It  was  one  of  the  most 
foolish  and  most  useless  wars  in  history.  The  Athens  of 
Pericles  was  gone  for  ever,  and  though  the  Athenians  were 
still  remarkable  for  their  artists  and  scholars,  there  was  never 
another  chance  of  their  taking  the  lead  among  the  Greeks. 

Alcibiades  fled  once  more  after  the  fall  of  Athens  to  the 
Persians,  but  the  Spartans  persuaded  them  to  kill  him.  They 
set  fire  to  his  house,  and  when  he  ran  out  his  enemies  let  fly 
a  shower  of  arrows  at  him,  and  so  killed  him.  His  story  is 
one  of  the  strangest  told  of  the  great  men  of  Greece.  His 
cleverness  and  beauty  do  not  make  up  for  his  selfishness  and 
deceit.  He  was  one  of  the  chief  causes  of  his  city's  downfall, 
though  probably,  if  he  had  been  allowed  to  lead  the  army  in 
Sicily  instead  of  being  called  back  for  punishment,  he  would 
have  led  it  to  victory.  But  he  was  hardly  great  enough  to 
have  conquered  the  Spartans,  and  even  if  he  had  done  so  he 
could  never  have  made  a  great  Greek  empire  with  Athens  at 
its  head.  Probably  no  one  could  have  done  this,  though  we 
cannot  help  wishing  that  it  had  been  done,  so  that  the 
learning  and  cleverness  of  the  Athenians  might  have  had  an 
even  greater  influence  on  the  world  than  they  have  had.  As 
it  was,  Alcibiades,  whom  many  of  the  Athenians  had  petted 
and  admired,  helped  more  than  any  other  man  to  ruin  the 
greatness  of  Athens. 


CHAPTER    VII 

THE  LAST  DAYS  OF  GREEK  INDEPENDENCE 

It  might  have  seemed  that  now  there  was  nothing  to  prevent 
Sparta  uniting  all  the  states  of  Greece  in  one  empire.  But 
this  was  not  to  be.  The  Spartans  were  hardly  broad  enough 
in  the  way  they  looked  at  things,  and  the  Greek  states  were 
growing  more  and  more  jealous  of  each  other.  In  a  short 
time,  when  Thebes  grew  as  powerful  as  Sparta,  Athens  was 
glad  to  join  with  Sparta  against  Thebes,  a  city  which  she  had 
always  hated  because  of  its  tyranny  over  her  old  friend 
Platsea.  As  time  went  on  too,  the  Greeks  nearly  everywhere 
gave  themselves  up  more  and  more  to  pleasure.  Yet  just  at 
the  end  of  the  Peloponnesian  war,  some  of  them  showed 
that  they  could  still  fight  as  well  as  in  the  days  of  Marathon 
and  Thermopylae.  The  Spartans  had  during  the  war  been 
friendly  with  various  Persian  princes,  and  now  Cyrus,  the 
brother  of  the  Persian  King  Artaxerxes,  asked  permission  of 
Sparta  to  collect  an  army  in  Greece,  to  help  him  in  an 
expedition.  He  did  not  tell  what  the  expedition  was  for,  and 
many  Greeks,  who  had  been  fighting  at  home  and  had  nothing 
to  do,  joined  him.  In  all  there  were  thirteen  thousand,  and 
at  their  head  was  the  Spartan  Clearchus. 

Xenophon's  Great  March 

Among  them  was  Xenophon,  an  Athenian  and  a  pupil  of 
Socrates.  Cyrus  led  them  with  a  great  army  of  his  own  into  the 
very  centre  of  the  Persian  empire,  to  Babylonia,  to  fight  against 
Artaxerxes,  kill  him,  and  make  himself  king.    The  Greeks  were 


70  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

surprised  and  angry  when  they  found  what  he  was  doing,  but 
they  fought  bravely,  and  chased  the  Persians  opposed  to  them. 
But  Cyrus  himself  was  killed  instead  of  his  brother,  and  his 
army  ran  away.  The  Greeks  were  left  alone,  more  than  one 
thousand  miles  from  home,  with  enemies  all  round  them. 
The  Persians  were  afraid  of  them,  for  they  saw  that  a  small 
army  of  Greeks  was  still  more  than  equal  to  a  large  army  of 
Persians.  Artaxerxes  sent  one  of  his  officers  who  pretended 
to  be  their  friend,  and  offered  to  show  them  the  way  back  to 
Greece.  He  got  them  safely  out  of  Babylonia,  and  then  asked 
their  generals  and  captains  to  a  meeting  in  his  tent.  Here 
men  rushed  upon  them  and  killed  them,  and  the  army  of  ten 
thousand  was  left  without  their  chief  leaders  in  a  strange  land. 

Most  of  them  were  nearly  in  despair,  but  Xenophon 
spoke  to  the  chief  men  left,  reminding  them  of  the  great 
victories  which  Greece  had  won  over  Persia,  and  begging 
them  to  fight  their  way  home.  And  so  they  did.  They 
had  to  march  all  that  one  thousand  miles  through  strange 
countries  where  savage  tribes  attacked  them,  but  they  fought 
with  them,  and  took  food  and  went  on,  and  at  last  they 
came  within  sight  of  the  sea,  and  the  brave  men  who  had 
suffered  so  much,  and  so  cheerfully,  gave  a  great  cry  of  joy, 
for  they  knew  they  were  now  within  easy  reach  of  home. 

Afterwards,  when  he  was  safe  in  Greece,  Xenophon  wrote 
down  the  story  of  all  the  adventures  he  had  passed  through 
in  the  '  Retreat  of  the  Ten  Thousand.'  A  curious  fact  about 
Xenophon  is  that,  though  he  was  so  brave  and  clever,  he 
never  had  any  love  for  Athens,  his  own  city.  He  even  once 
fought  for  the  Spartans  against  the  Athenians,  when  Athens 
was  helping  Thebes  in  a  fight  with  Sparta. 

The  Spartans  sent  an  army  under  one  of  their  kings  to 
fight  the  Persians  in  Asia  Minor,  and  she  also  sent  out  a  fine 
fleet,  but  Agesilaus,  the  king,  was  called  back  to  fight  Thebes, 
and  Athens  who  had  joined  her.  Athens  had  built  her  long 
walls  again  in  spite  of  Sparta.  Agesilaus  defeated  the  army 
of  Thebes  and  Athens,  but  meanwhile  his  fleet  was  destroyed 


LAST  DAYS  OF  GREEK  INDEPENDENCE    71 


by  the  Persians,  with  an  Athenian  to  lead  them,  and  Sparta 
gave  up  the  idea  of  becoming  a  great  sea-power.  She  also 
made  peace  with  the  Great  King,  who  was  left  free  once  more 
to  take  as  his  own  the  Greek  colonies  in  Asia  Minor. 

Sparta  had  set  up  in  many  cities  of  Greece  a  government 
like  her  own,  and  in  Thebes  among  others. 
Two  of  the  citizens  who  hated  this  govern- 
ment had  been  sent  into  exile,  but  they 
made  up  their  minds  to  upset  the  govern- 
ment. They  dressed  themselves  as  hunters, 
and  with  their  dogs  came  back  to  their  city, 
and  to  their  houses,  without  any  one  guess- 
ing who  they  were.  Some  of  their  friends 
gave  a  feast  to  the  two  governors,  who 
ruled  like  the  two  kings  in  Sparta,  and  the 
exiles  again  dressed  themselves  up,  this 
time  as  women,  and  went  into  the  room 
where  the  rulers  were  eating.  They  were 
taken  by  surprise,  and  easily  killed  by  the 
pretended  women. 

So  the  enemies  of  Sparta  came  into 
power.  Athens  sent  help  to  Thebes,  and 
the  Thebans  found  a  splendid  leader  in 
Epaminondas,  one  of  the  greatest  heroes  of 
Greek  history.  He  was  a  splendid  soldier, 
and  a  very  noble  character.  He  had  not 
taken  any  part  in  killing  the  rulers  set  up 
by  Sparta.  He  was  clever  too,  and  had 
studied  philosophy,  and  in  some  ways  was 
very  like  Pericles.  As  soon  as  the  Thebans  had  become  free 
themselves,  they  helped  the  other  cities  which  Sparta  had 
conquered  to  set  themselves  free.  Epaminondas  won  a  great 
victory  over  the  Spartans,  at  Leuctra.  In  the  battle  Epami- 
nondas used  a  quite  new  way  of  attacking  the  enemies'  lines, 
and  he  is  considered  one  of  the  world's  great  generals.  Seven 
hundred    Spartans    were    killed,    and    only   three    hundred 


GREEK    SOLDIER    WITH 
CORINTHIAN      HELMET 

(From  a  statuette  in  the 
Louvre). 


72  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

Thebans,  but  Sparta  pretended  not  to  care,  and  forbade  any 
public  show  of  sorrow. 


Epaminondas,  the  Hero  of  Thebes 

The  Thebans  were  now  the  chief  people  in  Greece,  but 
the  other  cities  soon  became  as  jealous  of  them  as  of 
Sparta,  and  the  Spartans  took  advantage  of  this  to  make 
another  attack  on  Thebes.  Another  great  battle  was  fought 
at  Mantinea.  For  a  long  time  it  seemed  doubtful  which 
of  the  splendid  armies  would  win,  but  at  last  Epaminondas 
led  a  picked  band  of  his  best  men  in  a  determined  dash 
on  the  enemy.  The  Spartan  leader  was  wounded,  and  the 
Thebans  won  the  battle,  for  soon  afterwards  the  Spartans 
sent  to  ask  permission  to  bury  their  dead,  which  meant  that 
they  owned  that  they  were  defeated. 

But  Epaminondas  too  was  wounded  to  death.  A  javelin, 
a  sharp  weapon  with  a  pointed  head  of  iron  and  a  handle  of 
wood,  stuck  in  his  breast.  The  wooden  part  broke  off,  and 
the  doctors  said  that  as  soon  as  the  head  should  be  pulled  out 
of  his  breast,  the  brave  leader  must  die.  But  Epaminondas 
did  not  care  at  all  so  long  as  the  victory  was  won.  After 
his  death  peace  was  made,  and  for  a  short  time  no  one  Greek 
state  tried  to  conquer  the  others.  Even  if  he  had  lived, 
Epaminondas  would  never  have  been  able  to  join  all  the 
Greeks  together.  He  was  like  Alcibiades  in  that,  a  great 
soldier  but  not  a  very  clever  statesman.  So  Thebes,  like 
Sparta  and  Athens,  fell  once  more  to  the  level  of  the  other 
states.  But  there  was  a  country  to  the  north  of  Greece, 
which  was  not  properly  Greek,  but  which  succeeded  for  a 
time  where  the  Greeks  had  failed,  and  joined  them  together 
for  a  while,  though  against  their  will. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

GREECE   AND    MACEDONIA 

To  the  North  of  Greece  proper  lay  a  country  which  the 
Greeks  called  JMacedonia.  Its  people  were  not  pure  Greeks, 
but  some  Greeks  had  probably  mixed  with  them  and  married 
among  them  in  early  times.  The  Macedonian  kings  declared 
that  they  themselves  belonged  to  an  old  Greek  family 
belonging  to  the  same  group  of  Greeks  as  the  Spartans. 
Certainly  the  kings  and  people  of  Macedonia  had  some 
of  the  best  qualities  of  both  Greeks  and  Barbarians. 
They  were  splendid  fighters,  and  though  the  people  were 
rough  and  uneducated,  the  kings  had  some  idea  of  Greek 
learning  and  philosophy.  Philip  of  Macedon,  who  was 
king  at  the  time  when  Sparta  and  Thebes  were  fighting, 
had  been,  as  a  boy,  for  three  years  in  Thebes.  He  had 
learned  a  great  deal  about  Greece,  and  probably  he  then  first 
got  the  idea  of  how  easy  it  would  be  for  a  really  strong 
power  to  conquer  it.  When  he  got  back  to  his  own 
country  there  was  a  great  deal  of  quarrelling  in  the  royal 
family  as  to  who  should  be  king,  but  Philip  made  himself 
king. 

Macedonia  had  already  a  good  army,  but  Philip  made  up 
his  mind  to  make  it  even  better.  There  were  some  fierce 
tribes  in  some  parts  of  the  country,  and  these  he  marched 
against  and  put  in  order.  Macedonia  was  of  course  bigger 
than  any  of  the  Greek  states,  and  Philip  was  able  to  get 
together  an  immense  and  splendid  army. 

73 


74  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

Demosthenes,  a  great  Athenian  Speaker 

As  soon  as  he  felt  strong  enough,  he  began  to  take  for 
himself  some  of  the  Greek  colonies  on  the  coast  near 
Macedonia.  Several  of  those  belonged  to  Athens,  but  the 
Athenians  did  not  try  to  prevent  it.  There  was  one  states- 
man, however,  in  Athens,  who  grew  passionately  angry 
against  Philip.  This  was  Demosthenes,  a  very  splendid 
speaker.  He  told  the  Athenians  over  and  over  again  that 
this  barbarian  king  of  the  North  would  soon  try  to  conquer 
all  Greece,  if  Athens  and  the  other  Greek  states  would 
not  join  to  fight  him  in  time.  Philip  gradually  began  to 
interfere  in  the  new  quarrels  among  the  Greek  states,  and 
especially  he  helped  to  defend  the  temple  of  Apollo  at 
Delphi,  which  had  been  attacked  by  the  Phocians.  He 
called  himself  a  Greek  and  got  some  of  the  Greeks  to  say 
that  Macedonia  was  a  Greek  state.  He  talked,  too,  very 
often  of  leading  an  army  of  all  the  Greek  states  (including 
Macedonia),  with  himself  at  its  head,  to  fight  the  Persians 
as  in  the  great  days  of  Greece. 

All  the  time  Demosthenes  was  warning  the  Athenians 
against  Philip.  So  bitterly  did  he  hate  him  that  he  said  he 
would  rather  have  the  Persians  themselves.  Even  to-day, 
when  any  one  speaks  very  angrily  for  a  long  time  against 
anybody,  we  call  such  a  speech  a  '  Philippic,'  in  memory  of 
the  long  speeches  in  which  Demosthenes  tried  to  stir  up  the 
Athenians  against  Philip. 

At  last  it  became  plain  that  the  things  which  Demosthenes 
said  against  Philip  were  true  and  that  he  really  meant  to 
conquer  all  Greece.  At  last  the  Thebans  and  Athenians 
joined  and  fought  a  great  battle  with  Philip  at  Chgeroncea. 
The  Macedonian  soldiers  had  always  been  brave,  but  before 
Philip  had  trained  them  they  had  had  only  shields  made 
of  wicker,  and  rusty  swords.  But  Philip  had  taught  them 
all  that  he  had  learned  about  fighting  in  Thebes,  and  the 
Greeks  found  that  they  had  to  fight  against  men  who  were 


GREECE  AND  MACEDONIA 


75 


stronger  and  better  trained  than  themselves.  Philip  won  a 
complete  victory.  He  was  very  severe  with  the  Thebans,  but 
quite  kind  to  the  Athenians.  He 
was  now  head  of  all  Greece,  but  he 
did  not  live  long  to  enjoy  his  power. 

Philip  was  a  strange  mixture  of 
Greek  and  Barbarian.  He  was  of 
course  brave  and  clever,  and  a  great 
general.  But  he  had  some  terrible 
faults.  He  was  very  fond  of  wine 
and  often  drank  too  much.  When 
he  was  in  this  state  he  did  and  said 
very  curious  things.  One  day  a 
woman  came  and  asked  him  to  settle 
a  quarrel  for  her,  and  he  settled  it 
quite  wrongly.  The  woman  quietly 
said,  *I  appeal.'  '  To  whom  do  you 
appeal  ? '  asked  the  king.  '  To  Philip 
sober,'  answered  the  woman.  Philip 
saw  that  she  was  right,  and  now 
settled  the  quarrel  quite  differently. 
The  saying  *To  appeal  from  Philip 
drunk  to  Philip  sober '  is  now  a  very 
common  one. 

Philip  had  several  wives,  imitating 
in  this  the  Eastern  kings.  This 
was  not  a  Greek  custom,  and  in 
it  Philip  showed  the  Barbarian 
side  of  his  character.  His  first 
wife  was  Olympias,  who  was  also  demosthenes,  the  enemy  of  phiup 
half  a  Greek.  The  people  said 
she  was  a  witch,  and  she  was 
certainly    very    passionate    and 

sometimes  seemed  almost  mad.  She  and  Philip  quarrelled 
terribly,  and  naturally  she  did  not  like  his  other  wives.  Philip 
and  Olympias  had  a  son  called  Alexander,  who  became  king 


OF    MACEDON 


(From  a  statue  at  Rome) 


76  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

after  his  father,  and  is  famous  in  history  as  Alexander  the 
Great.  Alexander  took  his  mother's  part  in  her  quarrels,  and 
was  not  very  friendly  with  Philip. 

It  was  during  the  rejoicings  over  the  marriage  of  his 
daughter  that  Philip  died,  being  killed  by  a  young  man  who 
belonged  to  his  bodyguard  but  thought  that  Philip  had  been 
unjust  to  him.  During  the  marriage  festival  there  was  a 
procession  to  a  theatre,  where  a  play  was  to  be  held.  Statues 
of  the  twelve  great  gods  of  Greece  were  carried  in  the 
procession,  and  behind  them  one  of  Philip  himself,  as  though 
he  too  was  a  god.  Then  came  the  king,  but  just  as  he 
reached  the  door  of  the  theatre  the  young  man  rushed 
forward  and  stuck  a  sword  right  through  his  body.  Philip 
fell  dead.  The  young  man  ran  away,  but  tripped  and  fell 
and  was  killed  by  the  king's  friends.  The  Greeks  rejoiced 
at  Philip's  death,  but  it  did  not  free  them  from  the  Mace- 
donians, for  in  Alexander  they  had  to  deal  with  a  king  as 
brave  as  his  father  and  cleverer,  and  even  more  anxious  for 
power.  For  the  next  few  years  the  history  of  Greece  must 
be  told  in  connection  with  the  wonderful  story  of  Alexander 
the  Great. 

Alexander  the  Great 

Alexander,  the  son  of  Philip  of  Macedon,  was  only  twenty 
years  old  when  his  father  died.  Demosthenes  told  the  people 
of  Athens  that  when  he  had  seen  him  a  few  years  before  he 
was  a  dull  boy.  Demosthenes  thought  that  the  power  of 
Macedon  was  at  an  end,  but  he  can  have  been  only  a  very 
poor  judge  of  character.  Alexander  was  a  fine,  handsome 
boy  with  a  beautiful  fair  skin,  blue  eyes,  and  golden  hair. 
There  is  a  bust  of  him  in  the  Museum  of  the  Louvre 
at  Paris,  which  shows  him  with  fine  shapely  features  and 
a  noble  forehead.  Some  people  said  that  he  was  not  the 
son  of  Philip  at  all,  but  that  the  god  Jupiter  was  his 
father. 


GREECE  AND  MACEDONIA  77 

Alexander  had  of  course  a  remarkable  father  and  mother. 
In  him  can  be  seen  his  mother's  power  of  imagination,  with- 
out her  tendency  to  madness.  He  had  his  father's  ambition, 
courage,  and  power  of  ruling  in  a  much  higher  degree.  He 
soon  showed  the  Greek  cities  that  they  could  not  throw  off  the 
Macedonian  power.  The  city  of  Thebes,  which  dared  to  rise 
up  against  him,  was  destroyed,  all  but  one  house,  that  which 
had  formerly  belonged  to  the  poet  Pindar ;  for  Alexander, 
like  his  father,  had  great  respect  for  the  art  and  poetry  of 
Greece.  He  was  himself  a  pupil  of  Aristotle,  the  greatest 
of  all  the  Athenian  philosophers. 

It  is  said  that  Alexander  asked  the  Greeks  in  his  army 
who  were  helping  him  against  Thebes  what  should  be  done 
to  that  city,  and  it  was  by  their  advice  that  it  was  destroyed. 
Alexander  himself  was  not  generally  cruel,  but  among  these 
Greeks  were  men  from  Platsea,  which  had  been  by  this 
time  built  up  again,  and  they  advised  the  destruction  of 
Thebes  in  revenge  for  the  destruction  of  their  own  city 
years  before. 

But  the  conquest  of  Greece  was  only  one  part  of 
Alexander's  work.  He  did  not  see  why  a  Greek,  as  he 
called  himself,  should  not  conquer  Persia  as  Persia  had  long 
ago  tried  to  conquer  Greece.  He  got  together  an  army  of 
thirty-five  thousand  men,  and  marched  with  them  across  the 
Hellespont.  When  he  was  half-way  across,  he  killed  a  bull 
as  a  sacrifice  to  the  god  and  goddesses  of  the  sea,  and  poured 
wine  from  a  golden  cup  into  the  water.  When  his  ship  drew 
near  to  the  land,  he  flung  a  spear  into  the  earth  as  a  sign 
that  he  meant  to  win  the  land  for  his  own. 

The  Persian  leader  who  was  sent  to  fight  Alexander  advised 
that  his  army  should  fall  back  before  the  Greeks  and  destroy 
everything  on  the  way,  so  that  Alexander  and  his  army 
would  have  been  without  fojod.  But  his  good  advice  was  not 
followed,  and  the  Persian  army  waited  for  the  Greeks  to 
come  up  to  them.  In  order  to  reach  them  the  Greeks  had 
to  cross  the  river  Granicus,  which  was  very  deep  in  some 


78 


THE  STOKY  OF  THE  WORLD 


places.  Alexander's  chief  captain  advised  him  to  wait  until 
the  next  morning  before  crossing,  but  Alexander  was  too 
impatient.  He  said  he  would  not  be  stopped  by  a  little 
stream,  and  spurred  his  horse  into  the  river.  The  whole 
army  followed,  and  a  great  battle  was  fought  on  the  other 
side.    Alexander  himself  killed  two  of  the  Persian  leaders  and 

went  into  the  very  thickest 
of  the  fight.  He  would 
indeed  have  been  killed  but 
for  the  quickness  of  the 
captain  of  his  bodyguard, 
named  Clitus.  One  of  the 
Persians  was  in  the  very 
act  of  bringing  his  sword 
down  in  a  deadly  blow  on 
the  head  of  Alexander, 
when  Clitus  swiftly  cut  off 
the  hand  which  held  the 
sword.  Alexander  won  a 
great  victory,  and  all  Asia 
Minor  submitted  to  him. 

The  men  who  had 
fought  hardest  on  the 
Persian  side  were  some 
Greek  soldiers,  who  fought 
for  money.  When  these 
were  taken  as  prisoners, 
Alexander  sent  them  home  to  work  as  slaves  in  Macedonia, 
for  he  said  they  were  traitors  to  Greece.  But  he  had  the 
enemy's  dead  buried  with  all  respect,  like  those  of  his  own 
army  who  had  been  killed.  He  sent  three  hundred  suits  of 
armour,  taken  from  the  Persians,  to  be  dedicated  to  the 
goddess  Athene  in  the  Acropolis  of  Athens,  and  had  these 
words  sent  with  them  :  '  From  Alexander,  son  of  Philip,  and 
the  Greeks  (except  the  Lacedaemonians),  out  of  the  spoil  of 
the  foreigners  inhabiting  Asia.'      The   Lacedaemonians  was 


ALEXANDER    THE    GREAT 


(From  the  fine  bust  in  the  Louvre). 


GREECE  AND  MACEDONIA 


79 


another  name  for  the  Spartans.    Alexander  made  an  exception 
of  them  because  they  had  refused  to  join  in  his  expedition. 


The  GoRDiAN  Knot 

At  Gordium,  one  of  the  towns  of  Asia  Minor  which 
Alexander  took,  he  was  shown  a  chariot,  said  to  belong  to 
the  man  who  had  founded  the  city.     It  was  tied  up  with 


THE    UATTLE    BETWEEN    ALEXANDER    AND    DARIUS    AT    ISSUS 

(From  a  wonderful  picture  in  mosaic  found  at  Pompeii,  said  to  have  been  made  from  a  painting  by  a 
Greek  artist.     It  shows  Darius  turning  to  fly  from  the  battlefield  when  he  saw  that  he  was  defeated). 

cords  which  were  fastened  in  a  knot  which,  it  was  said,  no 
one  could  undo.  Alexander  took  his  sword  and  solved  the 
difficulty  by  cutting  the  cord  across.  It  was  said  that  the 
man  who  undid  the  knot  should  conquer  the  world. 

A  second  great  battle  was  fought  next  year  at  the  river 
Issus.  This  time  the  Persian  king  was  there.  He  was 
another  Darius  by  name.  The  Persian  army  is  said  to  have 
had  six  hundred  thousand  men  in  it,  but  it  was  one  of 
the  immense  useless  armies  of  unwilling  soldiers  which  the 
Greeks  had  met  and  conquered  so  often.  The  dashing  attack 
of  Alexander  scattered   it,  and  Darius   himself  ran   away. 


80  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

Alexander  seized  the  Persian  camp,  and  among  others  the 
mother,  wife  and  daughter  of  Darius  were  taken  prisoners. 
They  were  crying  because  they  thought  the  king  had  been 
killed,  but  Alexander  told  them  that  he  had  got  safely  away, 
and  so  comforted  them.  Alexander  was  nearly  always  kind 
and  polite  to  his  enemies  when  they  were  in  his  power. 

He  next  took  all  the  coast  of  Syria  and  Phoenicia,  but 
the  old  city  of  Tyre,  though  it  would  have  submitted  to  him, 
refused  to  let  him  enter  the  city  to  sacrifice  to  one  of  its 
gods.  Alexander  was  terribly  angry  and  besieged  the  city 
for  seven  months.  He  brought  Phoenician  ships  to  help  him, 
and  when  at  last  Tyre  had  to  give  way,  Alexander  allowed 
his  soldiers  to  kill  most  of  the  men  in  cold  blood  on  the 
seashore.  The  women  and  children  were  sent  into  slavery. 
Alexander  was  terribly  angry  when  his  pride  was  offended, 
as  it  had  been  in  this  case.  He  sacrificed  at  the  shrine,  but 
there  was  little  to  be  proud  of  in  this  victory. 

Darius  was  not  a  very  strong  or  brave  king.  He  was  now 
thoroughly  frightened,  and  sent  word  to  Alexander  that  he 
would  give  up  to  him  all  the  land  west  of  the  river  Euphrates 
if  he  would  only  let  him  live  in  peace  beyond  that  river.  But 
even  such  an  immense  empire  could  not  satisfy  Alexander. 
His  chief  captain  Parmenio  said  to  him,  '  If  I  were  Alexander 
I  should  agree  to  this  rather  than  rush  into  further  dangers.' 
'  And  so  should  I,'  replied  Alexander,  '  if  I  were  Parmenio.' 

But  he  was  not.  He  was  full  of  imagination,  and  seems 
to  have  thought  it  possible  to  join  the  East  and  West  in 
one  great  empire.  It  was  not  possible,  for,  as  can  be  seen 
through  all  history,  the  people  of  the  East  are  quite  different 
from  those  of  the  West.  They  have  a  quite  different  way  of 
thinking  about  things.  But  Alexander  did  come  nearer  than 
anybody  to  joining  the  two. 

At  the  town  of  Gaza  Alexander  again  met  with  resistance, 
and  he  treated  it  with  the  same  cruelty  as  Tyre.  It  is  said 
that  he  went  to  Jerusalem  and  prayed  in  the  temple.  The 
Jews  welcomed  him,  for  they  had  suffered  much  under  Persian 


ALEXANDER    THE    GREAT,    THE    WORLD    CONQUEROR. 
(From  the  ancient  statue  in  the  Capitoline  Museum  at  Rome.) 


GREECE  AND  MACEDONIA  81 

rule,  and  they  showed  him  the  place  in  the  Book  of  Daniel 
which  says  that  a  Greek  would  conquer  the  Persians.  After- 
wards when  Alexander  built  the  city  of  Alexandria,  called 
after  himself,  he  invited  many  Jews  to  settle  there. 

From  Asia  Minor  Alexander  marched  into  Egypt, 
which  gave  in  to  him  immediately.  It  was  on  an  island  at 
the  mouth  of  the  Nile  that  he  built  Alexandria,  which  in  time 
became  the  second  greatest  city  in  the  world  at  the  time 
when  Rome  was  the  greatest.  From  Egypt  in  the  spring 
Alexander  led  his  men  right  across  Asia  beyond  the  Euphrates 
through  Mesopotamia,  and  across  the  Tigris,  and  there  at  last 
met  the  army  of  Darius.  The  battle  was  fought  not  very  far 
from  the  town  of  Arbela,  and  is  known  as  the  battle  of  Arbela. 
Darius  had  had  his  army  standing  all  night,  for  it  was  so  large 
that  he  was  afraid  that  if  the  soldiers  lay  down  to  sleep  he 
would  never  get  them  into  order  again.  The  Macedonians 
had  a  good  night's  sleep  and  were  quite  fresh  for  the  fight. 

The  army  of  Darius  was  rather  different  from  the  usual 
Persian  armies.  It  had  in  it  50,000  paid  Greek  soldiers  and  men 
from  wild  tribes  of  the  very  East.  There  were  elephants  too 
which  the  Greek  soldiers  had  never  seen.  Then  again  the  land 
beyond  the  Euphrates  had  always  been  considered  dangerous 
by  the  Greeks,  and  here  they  were  beyond  the  Tigris  as  well. 
But  Alexander's  soldiers  had  the  greatest  trust  in  him  and  no 
one  grumbled.  The  fight  was  fast  and  furious,  but  at  last  the 
Persian  army  fell  into  confusion,  and  Darius  once  more  fled 
from  the  field.  Alexander  marched  on  to  Babylon  and  then 
to  the  great  Persian  capital,  Susa,  and  took  it  for  his  own. 

At  Susa  Alexander,  having,  it  is  said,  drunk  too  much 
wine,  burnt  down  the  royal  palaces.  In  them  were  wonder- 
ful books  full  of  the  writings  of  the  great  Persian  philosopher 
Zoroaster  and  of  the  history  of  the  Persian  empire.  These 
were  lost  for  ever  to  the  world,  and  many  things  written  in 
these  books  can  never  now  be  known.  Alexander  was  bitterly 
sorry  afterwards,  and  indeed  it  was  one  of  the  worst  acts  of 
his  life,  and  we  find  it  hard  to  forgive  him  for  it.     He  then 

F 


82  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

marched  after  Darius,  who  was  running  away  with  Bersus,  one 
of  his  relations. 

For  weeks  Alexander  followed  him,  and  when  at  last 
Darius,  who  was  worn  out  and  weary  of  the  struggle,  knew 
that  he  would  be  caught,  he  told  Bersus  and  his  friends  that 
he  would  give  himself  up  to  Alexander.  But  Bersus  was  an 
ambitious  man,  and  as  he  knew  that  with  Darius  as  a  prisoner 
Alexander  would  be  surer  than  ever  of  keeping  Persia  for  his 
own,  he  turned  and  stuck  his  sword  in  Darius  and  killed 
him,  and  then  fled  on.  Darius  was  found  dying  by  one  of 
Alexander's  soldiers,  and  he  begged  him  to  thank  Alexander 
for  being  so  kind  to  his  wife  and  daughter.  Alexander 
buried  Darius  with  all  honour  in  the  old  tomb  of  the  Persian 
kings. 

Alexander  in  India 

In  four  years  Alexander  had  won  for  himself  the  great 
empire  of  Persia.  But  he  was  not  yet  satisfied.  He  stayed 
only  to  make  things  orderly  and  safe,  and  then  marched 
through  mountain  passes  into  the  great  unknown  continent 
of  India.  He  conquered  the  land  now  known  as  the  Punjab, 
and  had  a  famous  struggle  with  a  prince  called  Porus. 

Porus  was  almost  a  giant.  He  had  an  enormous  elephant 
on  which  he  used  to  ride  into  battle.  When  its  master  could 
no  longer  fight,  the  elephant  would  lie  gently  down,  let  him 
slide  from  its  back,  and  pull  the  arrows  from  its  body  with  its 
trunk.  Porus  was  defeated  and  taken  prisoner.  Alexander 
asked  him  how  he  wished  to  be  treated.  He  quietly  answered, 
*  Like  a  king.'  Alexander  was  so  pleased  with  the  answer 
that  he  gave  Porus  his  kingdom  back,  and  even  some  more 
land  to  make  it  larger.  But  of  course  Porus  had  to  own 
that  Alexander  was  over  him. 

Alexander,  too,  had  a  faithful  animal  which  he  loved  very 
much.  This  was  his  horse  Bucephalus,  which  he  had  ridden 
for  many  years.  Alexander  always  tried  to  save  it  from  too 
much  work  or  any  pain,  but  he  always  rode  it  in  battle. 


GREECE  AND  MACEDONIA  83 

It  was  wounded  in  the  battle,  and  died  soon  afterwards. 
Alexander  built  a  city  on  the  spot  where  it  was  buried,  and 
called  it  Bucephalia  after  the  horse. 

Alexander  would  probably  have  wished  to  add  all  India 
to  his  empire,  but  at  last  his  army  began  to  rebel,  and  would 
not  follow  him  any  farther.  He  led  them  back  through 
the  passes  of  North-West  India,  and  across  Asia  once  more  to 
Susa,  and  from  there  to  Babylon.  Here  he  fell  suddenly  ill 
of  a  fever  and  died.  He  was  only  forty-two  years  old.  In 
the  ten  years  that  he  had  been  in  Asia,  he  had  won  contests 
such  as  no  man  has  done  before  or  since.  We  can  only 
imagine  what  he  would  have  done  had  he  lived  longer. 

He  was  one  of  the  greatest  men  who  ever  lived.  Besides 
being  a  wonderful  soldier  and  leader  of  men,  he  was  generally 
kind  and  he  admired  noble  things.  Of  course  he  was  some- 
times cruel,  and  when  really  angry  he  was  quite  as  savage  and 
uncivilized  as  any  of  his  enemies.  It  is  dreadful  to  think 
that  he  killed  in  anger  his  great  friend  Clitus,  who  had  saved 
his  life  at  the  battle  of  Granicus.  In  anger  he  was  more 
Barbarian  than  Greek.  But  he  lived  in  a  savage  time,  and 
we  must  remember  that  the  Greeks,  who  had  been  civilized 
for  hundreds  of  years,  were  almost  equally  cruel.  With  all 
his  faults,  the  name  of  Alexander  the  Great  and  the  story  of 
his  life  will  always  remain  to  fill  men  with  wonder. 

The  End  of  Alexander's  Empire 

As  soon  as  Alexander  was  dead  his  great  empire  broke 
up,  and  his  generals  made  themselves  kings  of  different  parts 
of  it.  Some  of  these  rulers  very  soon  lost  much  of  their 
Greek  character,  and  became  very  much  like  the  people  they 
ruled.  In  time  most  of  them  were  conquered  by  the  Roman 
people,  who  soon  after  this  became  a  great  conquering  nation. 

The  cities  which  Alexander  had  built,  and  the  colonies  of 
Greek  soldiers  which  he  had  left  everywhere,  taught  the 
Eastern  people  something  of  Greek  civilization.     Alexandria 


84  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

became  almost  a  second  Athens,  famous  for  its  learning  and 
its  philosophy.  Macedonia  became  a  kingdom,  and  after 
many  quarrels  the  family  of  one  of  his  generals,  Antigonus, 
got  the  kingship,  and  it  remained  in  the  family  for  more  than 
a  hundred  years,  when  Macedonia  was  conquered  by  Rome 
and  made  part  of  the  Roman  empire. 

After  the  death  of  Alexander  the  Greeks  tried  to  free 
themselves  from  the  power  of  Macedonia,  but  the  Macedonian 
ruler  marched  against  them  and  made  them  give  in.  Demos- 
thenes, who  had  spent  so  many  years  in  the  struggle  against 
the  kingdom  which  he  hated  so  much,  and  had  hoped  that 
now  at  last  the  Greeks  would  be  free,  now  poisoned  himself 
in  despair. 

After  about  fifty  years  some  of  the  smaller  states  of 
Greece,  which  had  never  before  taken  much  part  in  her 
history,  joined  together  into  leagues,  and  for  the  first  time 
there  was  something  like  equality  between  the  states  of 
Greece.  These  smaller  states  were  content  to  be  equal  with 
each  other,  and  did  not  try  to  conquer  other  states  like  Sparta 
and  Athens  and  the  great  states  of  earlier  times.  But  they 
could  never  make  Greece  really  great  again,  and  even  now 
there  were  jealousies.  At  last  Sparta,  who  had  always  been 
ready  to  join  with  the  enemies  of  Greece  when  she  was  angry 
and  jealous,  called  in  the  Romans  against  the  Achaean  League, 
with  which  she  was  quarrelling.  The  Romans  came  and 
settled  the  quarrel  by  making  Greece  a  province  of  her  empire. 
This  was  in  the  year  146  b.c.  The  history  of  the  next  few 
hundred  years  is  the  history  of  this  wonderful  Roman  people 
which  had  grown  up  from  a  city-state  in  the  middle  of  Italy 
into  a  great  nation,  and  then  into  an  empire  the  greatest  the 
world  has  ever  known.  We  must  turn  back  more  than  six 
hundred  years  to  tell  the  tale  of  the  Roman  people  from  the 
beginning. 


CHAPTER  IX 

THE   RISE   OF  ROME 

The  Romans,  in  a  way,  show  us  a  world  very  much  like  that 
which  we  know  to-day.  There  are  no  such  things  as  city- 
states  now  as  there  were  in  Greece ;  but  the  great  empires 
and  nations  of  to-day  are  built  very  much  as  the  Roman 
empire  was  built.  The  Greeks  had  never  formed  a  great 
empire  because  they  were  not  able  to  join  together  for  any 
time.  From  the  very  beginning  the  Romans  were  very 
different.  The  history  of  the  seven  kings  of  Rome  is  a  story 
of  battles  and  struggles  against  various  enemies,  but  the  result 
is  always  much  the  same.  Conquerors  or  conquered,  they  join 
with  their  foes,  so  that  while  the  Roman  race  was  at  first  Latin, 
we  find  some  of  their  kings  Sabines  and  others  Etruscans. 

The  Romans  show  us  another  new  thing.  The  Greeks 
had  been  in  love  with  art  and  beauty  and  freedom.  It  would 
be  wrong  to  say  that  the  Romans  did  not  like  these  things, 
but  a  Roman  liked  strength  and  usefulness  and  order  much 
more,  The  Romans  gave  the  laws  to  the  world,  so  that  even 
now  when  men  study  the  laws  of  almost  any  country  they 
must  study  a  great  deal  that  is  Roman  law.  Everything  in 
the  Roman  Empire  was  done  by  rule.  Every  one  went  about 
his  business  for  a  certain  time  and  did  it  by  certain  rules. 
And  the  Romans  introduced  a  new  spirit  into  the  world. 
The  Greeks  always  thought  '  what  is  really  the  best  thing  ? ' 
The  Roman  way  of  looking  at  things  was  '  what  is  the  best 
and  easiest  thing  I  can  do  now  ? '  It  might  not  be,  it  pro- 
bably would  not  be,  on  most  occasions  the  really  best  thing ; 
but  it  was  the  thing  an  ordinary  practical  man  would  do. 

85 


86  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

It  was  this  spirit  which  helped  Rome  to  rule  in  time  over 
most  of  the  known  world.  The  Roman  was  a  man  of  business, 
and  he  did  just  the  best  thing  to  settle  any  question  at  the 
moment.  In  time  Romans  were  ruling  over  such  different 
peoples  as  the  British,  the  Egyptians,  the  French,  and  the 
Greeks,  and  many  others  with  great  success. 

In  each  case  the  Roman  Governor  set  about  things  in  an 
orderly  way.  He  had  men  to  help  him  who  each  did  his 
separate  task,  and  so  all  the  business  of  the  country  was  gone 
through.  Roman  soldiers  would  be  there  at  first,  but  by  and 
by  soldiers  who  belonged  to  the  country  would  be  taught  to 
take  their  part  in  the  army.  Great  roads  would  be  built,  roads 
which  were  made  so  strong  that  we  can  still  follow  them  in 
England  to-day.  Courts  where  people  could  go  and  obtain 
what  was  owing  to  them  would  be  set  up,  and  the  people  would 
be  taught  useful  arts.  Wherever  the  Romans  went  some  trace 
of  them  remains  to  this  day.  Many  English  towns,  such  as 
Chester,  Lancaster,  Winchester,  etc.,  have  earned  their  names 
from  the  Roman  name  for  a  camp,  castra.  And  not  only  in 
the  words  but  in  roads  and  buildings,  such  as  bridges,  are  their 
traces  to  be  seen. 

It  is  time  now  to  look  back  at  the  story  of  the  beginnings 
of  this  country  which  soon  took  its  place  as  the  seat  of  the 
chief  rulers  of  the  world.  In  shape  Italy  is  like  a  human  leg, 
with  the  island  of  Sicily  standing  near  the  toes.  It  is  like  a 
leg  in  another  way  :  it  has  a  hard  centre  running  throughout 
its  length.  The  Apennines,  as  the  mountain  ridge  is  called, 
do  not  run  through  the  exact  centre  of  Italy.  They  run  to 
the  east,  forming  in  this  way  a  rocky  coast  there,  while  the 
land  on  the  west  slopes  gradually  from  them  to  the  sea.  It  is 
important  to  remember  this,  for  it  explains  the  reason  why  the 
Greeks  never  invaded  much  of  Italy.  The  land  nearest  to 
Greece  was  this  same  rocky  eastern  shore  of  Italy,  on  which 
it  was  not  easy  to  make  harbours  for  ships.  And  so  the 
Greeks,  with  their  eyes  on  trading,  never  pushed  their  way 
much  beyond  the  southern  heel  of  Italy  and  the  south-west 


THE  RISE  OF  ROME  87 

fringe  of  the  coast ;  for  farther  north  than  Naples,  where  the 
Greeks  settled,  there  were  no  good  harbours. 

About  the  centre  of  the  western  side  of  Italy  there  is  a 
river  called  the  Tiber,  and  this  naturally  acted  as  a  line  divid- 
ing the  people  on  the  north  from  those  on  the  south.  On  the 
north  lived  a  race  which  is  one  of  the  oldest  in  the  world. 
They  were  called  the  Etruscans.  Where  the  Etruscans  origin- 
ally came  from  is  not  certainly  known,  but  it  is  thought  that 
they  grew  out  of  two  distinct  peoples,  one  that  came  from  the 
north  and  the  other  which  came  very  little  later  to  Italy  and 
crossed  the  Apennines  from  Lydia.  The  Etruscans  were  a 
highly  civilized  people.  We  read  of  a  league  which  they  made 
of  twelve  cities,  not  always  the  same,  but  cities  which  were 
great  and  important  enough  to  be  able  to  add  something  to 
the  general  defence.  The  cities  were  chiefly  what  we  should 
call  country  towns,  which  had  grown  great  from  the  crops, 
trees  and  cattle  produced  on  the  land  about  them.  They  were 
not  only  towns  on  the  sea-coast,  though  some  of  them  were, 
and  they  had  good  laws  and  some  of  the  love  of  colour  which 
Rome  borrowed  from  them.  The  Etruscans  who  lived  in  them 
were  great  fighters  and  made  the  Greeks  and  the  people  of 
Carthage  fear  them. 

Though  they  were  by  trade  a  farming  people,  in  their 
markets  might  be  found  the  traders  of  all  the  world.  The 
Greek  and  Phoenician  merchants  came  there  bringing  their 
gold  and  silver  and  ivory  and  bronze.  Some  of  these  precious 
metals  were  no  doubt  dug  from  their  own  mines,  but  the 
greater  part  found  its  way  into  the  land  through  the  hands  of 
traders,  and  the  Etruscans,  who  did  not  know  how  to  make 
beautiful  things  themselves,  sold  their  metals,  cattle  and  crops 
for  such  things  as  Egyptian  vases  and  Phoenician  cups.  They 
were  a  people  who  loved  luxury.  Their  slaves  were  beautifully 
dressed,  and  at  their  meals  splendidly  embroidered  tablecloths 
and  fine  cups  and  plates  of  gold  and  silver  were  used.  They 
were  good  flute-players,  and  flutes,  harps  and  trumpets  were 
played  while  they  worked.     They  loved  music  and  dancing. 


88 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


TTF 


hunting  and  the  watching  of  fights  in  which  strong  men  fought 
between  themselves  and  against  beasts. 

About  three  hundred  years  after  the  Etruscans  settled 
down  we  find  four  great  races  grouped  about  the  Tiber :  to 
the  north  and  west  the  Etruscans,  to  the  east  and  north-east 
the  Umbrians,  a  little  farther  south  the  Samnites,  and  to  the 
south  the  Latins.  These  last  three  peoples  belonged  to 
the  great  Aryan  race,  and  they  were  found  already  settled 

.  when  the  Etruscans  pushed 

illlll''lllBlfei  their  way  over  the  Apen- 
nines. The  Latins  were 
settled  south  in  the  plains 
of  the  Tiber,  and  from  them 
it  earned  its  name,  Latium. 
Many  different  races  ruled 
Rome  at  different  times,  but 
it  was  the  Latin  language 
that  the  people  of  Rome 
spoke  from  the  beginning. 
The  plain  of  Latium  had 
also,  like  the  land  where 
the  Etruscans  lived,  many  cities — of  some  of  them  we  know 
a  little ;  and  several  have  been  made  famous  by  the  stories  of 
old.  Lavinium  and  Alba  Longa  are  the  best  known,  and  the 
latter,  which  was  about  twelve  miles  south-east  of  Rome, 
will  be  mentioned  again. 


AN    ANCIENT     ETRUSCAN     PAINTING  : 
MAKING    A    SACRIFICE    AT    AN    ALTAR 

(A  tomb  painting  from  Csere,  now  in  the  Louvre) 


The  Story  of  Romulus  and  Remus 

History  can  tell  us  very  little  of  the  beginning  of  Rome. 
The  name  '  Rome '  is  thought  to  mean  '  river.'  And  as 
the  city  stands  on  the  bank  of  the  Tiber  this  seems  probable ; 
but  it  is  quite  uncertain.  There  is  a  very  old  story  which 
connects  the  founding  of  Rome  with  twin  brothers,  Romulus 
and  Remus.  The  story  says  that  they  were  grandsons  of 
the  King  Numitor,  who  ruled  over  Alba  Longa.     Numitor's 


THE  RISE  OF  ROME  89 

brother  took  the  throne  and  ordered  the  baby  grandsons  of 
Numitor  to  be  put  into  a  basket  and  thrown  into  the  Tiber. 
The  waters  in  the  river  ran  very  high  at  the  time,  but  when 
they  sank  lower  the  basket  was  left  standing  in  the  Roman 
marshes,  and  the  children  were  fed  by  a  wolf  as  if  they  had 
been  its  own  babies.  Afterwards  they  were  found  by  a 
shepherd  on  the  Palatine  Hill,  and  were  from  that  time 
brought  up  with  his  children.  Sturdy  and  strong  they  grew 
up,  and  became  in  time  leaders  of  a  band  of  brave  shepherds. 
In  one  of  their  numerous  fights  they  came  to  know  who 
their  grandfather  was,  and  then  they  fought  for  him,  and  set 
him  upon  his  throne  once  more.  They  thought  it  would  be 
a  good  thing  to  build  a  city  in  the  place  where  they  had 
grown  up ;  but  the  brothers  now  quarrelled  and  Remus  was 
killed.     Romulus  then  built  his  city  upon  the  Palatine  Hill. 

This  story  has  been  told  in  many  different  ways.  Some- 
times the  father  of  Romulus  and  Remus  is  the  god  Mars, 
sometimes  he  is  only  '  a  stranger. '  The  wolf  who  fed  the 
babies  is  also  in  some  of  the  stories  a  woman.  There  are 
other  stories,  too,  which  tell  of  the  history  of  the  Latin  people 
and  the  towns  of  Latium  many  hundreds  of  years  before. 
But  they  are  only  stories,  with  so  much  that  we  know  is 
untrue,  although  it  is  very  interesting,  that  it  is  wiser  not  to 
tell  them  again. 

All  we  know  for  certain  is  that  some  shepherds  from  Alba 
Longa  built  the  city  of  Rome  on  the  square-shaped  Palatine 
Hill,  which  looks  down  on  the  river,  probably  as  a  fortress  or 
strong  place  to  prevent  the  Etruscans  coming  farther  south. 
But  it  was  built  long  before  the  time  at  which  the  first  king 
is  said  to  have  lived.  Romulus  was  probably  a  leader  of  the 
people,  and  he  is  supposed  to  have  built  the  city  in  the  year 
753  B.C.  This  date  is  one  of  the  most  important  in  all 
history.  It  begins  Roman  history,  and  the  years  have  ever 
been  reckoned  from  it  even  to  this  day. 

Very  early  in  the  history  of  Rome  we  find  it  already  strongly 
defended  against  its  enemies,  and  with  wise  rulers  for  its  govern- 


90  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

ment.  The  people  were  composed  of  three  classes  :  Patricians, 
who  are  thought  to  have  been  descended  from  the  Sabines,  a 
branch  of  the  Umbrian  race  ;  the  Clients,  who  depended  upon 
the  Patricians  in  some  way;  and  the  Plebeians,  who  were  people 
the  Romans  had  conquered,  or  who  had  come  to  Rome  for 
protection  against  some  enemy.  The  Patricians  alone,  at 
first,  could  have  a  share  in  the  government,  be  fully  protected 
by  the  laws  and  take  part  in  the  Roman  religion.  The 
Clients,  some  of  whom  were  slaves,  were  people  who  wished 
to  have  the  protection  of  the  laws  and  be  Roman  citizens, 
and  they  were  able  to  have  these  by  choosing  a  Patrician  as 
a  *  patron,'  who  could  represent  them  in  any  business  with 
other  citizens.  The  patron  and  Clients  had  very  serious 
duties  to  each  other.  The  Plebeians  were  at  first  people  who 
were  almost  as  free  and  fully  protected  by  the  laws  as  the 
Patricians,  but  they  did  not  need  to  have  a  patron.  Of 
course,  it  was  not  long  before  these  three  classes  became 
really  two :  the  Patricians  and  the  Plebeians,  the  Clients 
becoming  really  a  part  of  the  Plebeian  class. 

Although  we  do  not  know  much  certainly  of  the  reign  of 
Romulus,  we  do  know  it  must  have  been  a  very  troubled 
time.  The  stories  tell  of  fierce  battles  with  the  peoples  who 
dwelt  about  the  Palatine  Hill,  and  all  we  know  of  early 
Rome  shows  us  that,  though  the  language  of  its  people  was 
Latin,  the  divisions,  laws  and  customs  were  largely  those  of 
other  people.  An  old  story  tells  of  battles  with  the  Sabines, 
and,  as  we  have  seen,  the  real  ruling  people  of  Rome  were  of 
the  Sabine  race,  showing  that  they  must  have  been  readily 
accepted  as  brothers  by  the  Latins.  The  divisions  of  the 
people  were,  on  the  other  hand,  Etruscan. 

The  Patricians,  who  it  must  be  remembered  were  the  real 
Roman  people,  for  they  alone  had  full  rights  under  the  laws, 
were  divided  into  three  tribes ;  the  tribes  again  were  each 
divided  into  ten  parts  called  Curise.  There  were,  therefore, 
thirty  Curiae,  and  these  had  each  its  separate  religious 
ceremonies,  festivals,  priests  and  chapels,  together  chose  the 


THE  RISE  OF  ROME  91 

king  and  settled  questions  about  when  people  should  be  put 
to  death.  The  Curise  were  again  divided  into  families,  not 
families  like  those  we  speak  of  to-day,  but  more  like  those  of 
the  Israelites,  which  include  a  man  and  all  his  descendants 
and  relatives. 

A  hundred  of  the  older  men  forjmed  a  body  called  the 
Senate  and  helped  the  king  to  rule.  The  number  became 
greater  when  the  first  Romans  joined  with  the  Sabine  people. 
All  these  divisions  lasted,  though  changed  in  different  ways, 
for  hundreds  of  years,  the  Patricians  being  the  rulers,  the 
Senate  assisting  the  chief  ruler,  and  the  Curiae  or  wards 
choosing  the  ruler.  The  king  was  not  like  our  kings.  He 
was  not  only  the  head  man  among  the  people,  but  he  was  the 
chief  man  in  the  religious  ceremonies,  offering  the  sacrifices 
and  consulting  the  gods,  and  he  actually  sat  in  the  courts 
saying  what  was  right  and  wrong,  punishing  the  evil-doers  and 
protecting  the  weak.  The  state  was  looked  upon  as  a  great 
home,  and  it  therefore  had  a  hall  and  hearth.  On  the  hearth 
devoted  women  called  Vestal  Virgins  kept  ever  alight  a 
sacred  fire,  which  an  old  story  said  had  been  brought  years 
before  from  Troy. 

The  time  during  which  the  first  four  kings  of  Rome  reigned 
was  nearly  a  hundred  and  fifty  years,  and  during  this  time 
many  important  things  happened.  Rome  was  continually 
growing,  and  when  King  Ancus  died  nearly  the  whole  of  the 
seven  hills  upon  which  Rome  is  built  had  been  taken  into  the 
city  which  had  started  upon  one.  The  religion  of  the  people 
had  become  more  fixed.  Alba  Longa  had  been  conquered  and 
destroyed,  though  its  people  became  Romans,  a  bridge  had  been 
built  over  the  river  to  a  fortress — a  building  strongly  defended 
against  the  enemy, — ^and  a  colony,  Ostra,  had  been  founded  at 
the  mouth  of  the  river  Tiber. 

The  fifth  king  of  Rome  was  an  Etruscan,  and  under  his 
rule  and  that  of  the  two  Etruscans  after  him  Rome  begins  to 
have  some  of  the  look  of  the  city  which  is  known  to  later 
history.     Two  other  hills  were  taken  into  the  city,  and  the 


92 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


seven  hills  were  now  surrounded  with  a  great  high  wall. 
Vast  buildings  begin  to  rise,  such  as  the  huge  temple  on  the 
Capitoline  Hill.  Great  drains  and  sewers  were  built  to  carry 
away  the  stagnant  water  which  lay  in  the  low  places,  a  circus 
was  laid  out,  and  fights  like  those  which  the  Etruscans  loved 

to  watch  were  arranged. 
But  the  Etruscan  kings, 
the  Tarquins  as  they  are 
sometimes  called,  because 
Tarquin  was  the  name  of 
the  first  and  last,  gave 
more  than  this  to  Rome. 
They  gave  her  above  all 
a  great  position  in  Italy. 
From  the  earliest  times 
the  small  city-states  of 
Latium,  like  those  among 
the  Etruscans,  would  join 
together  to  form  a  league. 
Alba  Longa  had  long  ago 
been  the  head  of  one  of 
these  leagues  of  thirty 
cities.  In  the  league 
which  existed  at  this  time 
the  Tarquins  gave  Rome 
a  leading  position,  and  it 
is  probable  for  the  first 
time  brought  the  city 
into  contact  with  the 
Greeks.  The  Tarquins  were  proud  men  and  great  fighters, 
and  when  they  had  won  a  victory  they  would  come  back  to 
the  city  very  gaily,  wearing  beautiful  dresses  and  driving  in 
carriages  drawn  by  numbers  of  white  horses.  This  was  the 
beginning  of  what  became  a  famous  Roman  custom.  Every 
great  Roman  soldier  who  had  won  a  battle  looked  on  it  as  his 
reward  to  enter  Rome  in  triumph,  and  these  triumphs  were 


AN    ETRUSCAN    SOLDIER 


(From  a  statuette). 


THE  RISE  OF  ROME  93 

sometimes  almost  as  picturesque  and  fine  to  look  upon  as  a 
Lord  Mayor's  show  to-day.  Sometimes  the  leaders  of  the 
enemy  were  dragged  along  in  the  procession  ;  at  one  time  it 
was  thought  a  great  thing  to  have  a  number  of  elephants 
walking  together,  and  once  the  soldier  entered  the  city 
between  a  long  line  of  elephants  holding  lighted  torches. 
The  people  came  to  like  these  triumphs,  for  they  could  see 
the  great  soldier  and  the  strange  sights  and  shout  *  Hail, 
Commander '  as  loudly  as  they  liked. 

These  Tarquin  kings  had  not  been  lawfully  chosen  as  the 
Roman  laws  ordered.  So  far  as  we  can  see,  they  must  have 
been  invaders  who  seized  Rome ;  but  they  did  great  things 
for  the  growing  city.  They  did  not  care  much  about  the 
liberty  of  the  Romans,  and  the  last  of  them,  Tarquin  the 
Proud,  came  in  this  way  to  be  driven  from  the  city.  The 
kings  before  them  had  been  simple  and,  on  the  whole,  good 
rulers.  The  Tarquins  brought  to  Rome  the  luxury  their 
people  loved.  They  also  increased  the  number  of  the  senators, 
and  the  new  senators  were  chosen  from  the  states  conquered 
by  Rome.  They  changed  the  way  the  army  was  chosen, 
though  this  made  the  old  Roman  families  very  angry. 
Tarquin  the  Proud  was  certainly  a  bad  king,  but  nothing  we 
know  of  him  really  tells  us  the  reason  why  the  Romans  for 
hundreds  of  years  afterwards  hated  the  very  name  of '  king.' 
He  made  the  Romans  feared  by  all  the  Latin  states  around. 
And  when  he  ceased  to  be  king  the  Roman  power  for  a  time 
became  much  smaller.  But  when  his  son  insulted  one  of 
the  noblest  Romen  women,  Lucretia,  the  Romans  said  that 
Tarquin  should  rule  no  longer,  that  neither  he  nor  any  of 
his  relations  should  be  allowed  to  enter  Rome,  and  that  they 
would  never  have  another  king. 

Tarquin  was  not  in  Rome  at  the  time.  He  was  away 
fighting  one  of  his  many  battles ;  but  he  did  not  mean  to 
give  up  being  king  without  a  struggle.  The  battles  which 
followed  showed  that  although  the  Tarquin  kings  had  made 
Rome  so  powerful,  the  people  had  the  courage  and  strength  to 


94  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

defend  themselves  if  they  wished.  The  people  of  two  other 
towns  joined  Tarquin  in  his  first  battle,  and  all  marched  out 
to  the  borders  of  the  city  of  Rome.  But  here  the  Romans 
met  them  and  defeated  the  great  army.  The  next  battle,  a 
year  later,  was  one  in  which  Tarquin  was  helped  by  all  the 
Etruscans  under  the  prince,  Lars  Porsena.  It  is  this  battle 
about  which  the  story  of  Horatius  is  told. 

The  Story  of  Horatius 

The  Etruscan  army  had  marched  so  near  to  Rome  that  only 
a  wooden  bridge  separated  them  from  the  city.  It  is  said  that 
the  Roman  soldier  Horatius  kept  all  the  enemy  from  crossing 
the  bridge  until  his  friends  had  broken  down  the  bridge  behind 
him,  when  he  jumped  into  the  river  and  swam  safely  back. 
Certainly  many  Roman  soldiers  must  have  fought  bravely 
that  day,  but  the  story  does  not  prevent  us  from  realizing 
that  Rome  was  so  thoroughly  beaten  by  the  Etruscans  that 
she  had  to  give  up  all  her  possessions  on  the  north  bank  of  the 
Tiber,  and  had  to  promise  to  make  no  more  fighting  weapons 
of  iron.  This  last  condition  she  did  not  keep  to  very  long. 
A  third  battle  was  fought  against  the  Latins,  this  time  led  by 
Mamilius,  son-in-law  of  Tarquin,  but  the  Romans  were  once 
more  the  winners,  and  Tarquin  ran  away  to  a  place  called 
Cumee,  where  he  died. 

There  were  to  be  no  more  kings,  and  so  the  Romans  chose 
two  chief  men  to  take  their  place.  It  was  thought  that  when 
there  were  two,  neither  could  be  so  strong  as  to  cause  the 
people  so  much  trouble  as  the  kings.  The  new  rulers  were 
called  consuls,  and  later  on  we  find  that  each  consul  had 
certain  powers  which  made  it  impossible  for  one  of  them  to 
be  very  powerful  without  the  other.  Most  of  the  great 
Romans  whose  names  we  know  during  the  next  five  hundred 
years  were  consuls.  The  kings  of  Rome,  so  far  as  we  can 
discover,  had  reigned  about  two  hundred  and  fifty  years. 
Very  few  things  are  sure  in  these  years ;  but  at  the  end  we 


THE  RISE  OF  ROME  95 

know  there  existed  a  Roman  city,  strongly  built,  with  some 
great  and  beautiful  buildings,  with  wise  laws,  and  a  people 
brave,  orderly  and  free.  The  Rome  which  we  hear  of  after- 
wards is  one  that  is  almost  continually  growing  in  power, 
and  it  is  the  Rome  which  has  made  the  world  like  it  is 
to-day. 


CHAPTER   X 

ROME  AND  THE  CELTS 

The  Etruscan  people  seem  to  have  been  at  the  highest 
point  in  their  history  when  the  last  of  the  Tarquins  was  put 
off  the  Roman  throne.  They  had  been  able  to  seize  and  hold 
the  rulership  of  the  city  for  a  sufficient  time  for  three  kings 
to  reign,  and  even  when  Tarquin  the  Proud  had  been  for- 
bidden to  enter  Rome  ever  again,  we  have  seen  how  the  great 
prince,  Lars  Porsena,  was  able  to  make  the  Romans  do  just 
what  he  wished.  It  could  not  have  been  easy  for  the  brave 
Roman  people  to  give  up  all  the  land  they  had  won  on  the 
north  side  of  the  Tiber.  Still  less  easy  was  it  to  promise 
never  to  use  iron  swords  and  spears  again.  But  the  Romans 
did  not  seem  to  look  on  their  agreement  as  being  very  binding, 
and  about  a  hundred  years  after  they  had  been  so  shamefully 
defeated  they  had  almost  completely  and  for  ever  put  an  end 
to  the  power  of  the  Etruscans. 

The  long  struggle  between  the  Romans  and  the  Etruscans 
was  really  a  struggle  between  Rome  and  the  strong  Etruscan 
town  Veii.  Sometimes  they  agreed  to  fight  no  more  for 
some  time.  This  happened  on  one  occasion  for  over  thirty 
years,  and  on  another  for  about  sixteen  years.  But  when 
the  time  for  which  they  had  agreed  to  be  at  peace  came  to  an 
end,  each  side  commenced  to  carry  on  the  war  as  vigorously 
as  before. 

Rome  was  all  this  time  becoming  more  powerful.  It 
made  agreements  with  the  strong  cities  and  peoples  near  by 
that  each  would  help  the  other  both  to  defend  themselves 
and  to  make  war  upon  an  enemy.     And  enemies  increased  as 

96 


ROME  AND  THE  CELTS         ^  97 

the  Roman  power  grew;  but  these  other  towns  kept  their 
promise,  and  so  Rome  was  protected  from  many  of  her 
enemies.  It  is  just  as  well  that  this  was  so ;  for  Rome  was 
defeated  by  Veii,  not  once  but  very  many  times.  On  one 
occasion,  however,  when  she  had  made  peace  with  Veii,  Rome 
regained  the  city  Fidense  and  the  land  which  Lars  Porsena 
had  made  her  give  up  thirty  years  before.  Yet,  although  this 
might  seem  to  be  a  great  victory,  it  was  not  long  before  the 
people  of  Fidense  rebelled,  killed  several  Romans,  and  joined 
the  king  of  Veii.  This  king  was  quickly  killed  by  the 
Romans,  and  the  city  of  Fidense  was  taken  once  again.  Can 
it  be  wondered  that,  when  the  peace  they  had  agreed  upon 
after  the  last  battle  was  ended,  the  Romans  made  up  their 
minds  to  conquer  the  people  of  Veii  once  for  all?  It  was 
almost  exactly  a  hundred  years  since  Lars  Porsena  had 
conquered  the  Romans. 

Rome's  First  Conquest 

Now  to  take  Veii  was  quite  a  new  idea  in  the  Roman 
history.  This  was  the  first  time  the  Romans  had  ever  set  out 
to  conquer  a  foreign  state.  It  was  the  first  time,  too,  that 
the  army  ever  went  out  for  so  long  a  time  and  did  not  return 
until  it  had  done  what  it  went  to  do.  The  long  hot  Italian 
summer  faded  into  autumn,  autumn  passed  into  winter,  and 
spring  came  again  not  once  but  perhaps  ten  times,  and  found 
the  Roman  army  still  shutting  in  the  great  city.  For  it  is 
said  that  it  was  ten  years  before  the  people  of  Veii  gave  in. 
There  were  no  great  guns,  as  there  are  now,  to  knock  down 
the  walls,  and  the  city  was  very  strong.  It  was  built  on  the 
top  of  a  flat  hill ;  and  round  each  side  but  one  there  was  a 
deep  valley,  a  ravine  as  it  is  called.  On  the  fourth  side  the 
people  had  built  a  great  wall  and  dug  a  deep  ditch.  So  that 
the  town  was  like  a  small  island,  only  it  could  not  have  been 
reached  by  boats.  At  length  after  ten  long  years  the  city 
was  taken  and  destroyed  in  the  year  396  by  the  brave  general 
called  Camillus. 

G 


98 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


The  Romans  could  never  have  taken  so  strong  a  city  if 
they  had  not  been  helped  by  their  friends,  and  if  the  people 
of  Veii  had  not  been  deserted  by  theirs.  The  reason  why  the 
Etruscans  did  not  help  their  ov^^n  people  who  lived  in  Veii  we 


^^'^aA 


^' 


>T'^ 


-r-^Jf 


ttit'   n 


£mT 


THE    STRONG    CITY    OF    VEII    BEFORE    IT    WAS    TAKEN    BY    THE    ROMANS    IN    396    B.C. 

(From  a  drawing  made  by  Canina,  a  famous  Italian  scholar,  after  studying 
all  the  remains  of  the  city). 

shall  see  in  a  moment.  It  must  have  been  a  very  serious 
reason,  for  when  Veii  was  conquered  several  other  Etruscan 
towns  had  to  agree  to  leave  Rome  in  peace.  In  this  way  the 
Romans  in  conquering  Veii  had  really  conquered  the  southern 
part  of  the  Etruscan  people. 


The  Early  Celts 

The  reason  why  their  friends  had  not  come  to  their  help  is 
that  they  were  themselves  fighting  against  an  enemy  who 
were  now^  first  being  heard  of  in  the  civilized  world.  Many 
of  the  boys  and  girls  who  read  this  book  are  probably  related 
to  this  new  enemy.  For  it  was  the  Celts,  who  are  the 
forefathers  of  the  French,  Welsh  and  Irish.  They  were  then, 
as  now,  very  brave ;  and  although  in  some  ways  they  seem 


ROME  AND  THE  CELTS  99 

to  have  been  just  the  same  as  they  are  at  present,  in  some 
others — less  important — they  were  very  different. 

From  this  time  we  find  them  marching  about  almost  every- 
where, gay,  brave,  careless,  not  caring  for  work  but  loving 
struggles  and  battles.  They  had  found  their  way  from  their  first 
home  in  the  east  to  the  far  west,  to  France  and  even  to  the 
British  Isles,  and,  in  fact,  it  was  in  France  they  made  their 
headquarters.  But  they  never  settled  anywhere  very  long,  and 
for  the  next  four  hundred  years  they  were  dreaded  by  every 
nation  until  the  great  Ceesar  after  years  of  war  made  them 
powerless.  Other  people  have  become  soldiers  to  defend 
their  country  against  the  enemy  or  to  increase  their  power. 
The  Celts  were  soldiers  just  because  they  loved  it.  They 
were  big  men  with  rough  shaggy  hair  and  bearded  faces ;  they 
often  wore  fine  clothing  and  broad  gold  bands  round  their 
necks.  When  they  were  horse-soldiers  they  made  fine  cavalry  ; 
but  when  they  fought  on  foot  they  were  almost  impossible  to 
resist.  So  daring  and  careless  were  they,  that  they  went  into 
a  battle  bareheaded ;  and  they  did  not  throw  spears  like  the 
Romans.  They  merely  rushed  straight  at  the  enemy,  and 
with  the  long  sword,  dagger  or  lance  cut  about  them,  protect- 
ing themselves  by  a  big  shield. 

It  was  this  people  who  changed  the  Roman  fortunes  in  so 
remarkable  a  way,  by  helping  them  to  conquer  Veii  by  fighting 
against  the  Etruscans  in  the  North.  They  did  so  in  an  even 
more  extraordinary  way,  too,  as  we  shall  see. 

Five  years  after  Veii  had  been  destroyed  a  band  of  Celts 
who  had  crossed  the  Alps  and  settled  for  a  short  time  on  the 
north-east  coast  of  Italy  suddenly  made  up  their  minds  to 
cross  the  Apennine  mountains,  and  they  tried  to  seize  the 
great  Etruscan  town,  Clusium.  It  was  the  prince  of  Clusium 
who  had  long  before  conquered  Rome;  but  now  when  the 
Etruscans  found  the  Celtic  soldiers  at  the  gates  of  their  city 
they  sent  to  Rome  to  ask  for  help.  The  Romans  saw  that 
this  meant  a  long  struggle  far  from  their  home,  and  so  they 
would  not  agree  to  help  the  people  of  Clusium.     But  they 


100  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

sent  messengers  to  tell  the  Celts  to  go  away.  Now  all  people 
have  agreed  to  leave  such  messengers,  ambassadors  as  they 
are  sometimes  called,  free,  and  the  messengers  themselves 
are,  of  com'se,  bound  not  to  fight  against  the  people  who 
trust  them  in  this  way.  But  the  Roman  messengers  fought 
with  some  men  of  Clusium  against  the  Celts,  and  this  made 
them  very  angry  indeed.  They  asked  the  Romans  to  send 
back  to  them  the  messengers  who  had  behaved  so  deceitfully ; 
but  the  Romans  would  not. 

The  Celtic  army  at  Clusium  then  at  once  set  out  for 
Rome.  It  was  a  very  large  army  for  those  days,  about 
seventy  thousand  men  ;  and  they  were  men  who  did  daring 
things  as  if  they  were  quite  ordinary.  Clusium  was  about 
eighty-five  miles  north  of  Rome,  and  before  the  Romans  had 
time  to  decide  how  to  defend  the  city  the  Celts  had  crossed 
the  Tiber  and  had  arrived  at  a  stream  called  the  Allia,  only 
about  twelve  miles  from  the  city.  It  was  only  at  this  point 
that  the  Romans  seem  to  have  realized  their  danger,  and  an 
army  of  forty  thousand  men  tried  to  stop  the  Celts. 

The  brave  Camillus  was  not  in  the  battle  on  this  day ;  and 
so  the  strong  Roman  legions  went  out  with  very  little  thought 
to  meet  the  terrible  enemy  whom  they  despised  as  barbarians. 
But  the  sudden  rushes  of  the  Celts  soon  put  the  Romans  in 
disorder,  drove  them  back,  huddled  them  together,  and  at  last 
drove  them  away  from  the  battlefield  so  filled  with  fear  that 
they  actually  left  their  homes  behind  and  ran  for  safety  to 
the  north  of  the  Tiber. 

The  Burning  of  Rome 

The  Celts  apparently  did  not  think  very  much  of  their 
victory.  They  waited  for  three  days  and  then  marched 
into  Rome.  The  gates  were  open  and  the  streets  empty. 
There  were  not  sufficient  soldiers  to  defend  the  city,  but 
several  had  gone  to  the  Capitol,  which  formed  a  fortified 
castle,  and  had  got  together  large  stores  of  provisions.     The 


ROME  AND  THE  CELTS  101 

Roman  women  and  children  had  been  sent  away  across  the 
Tiber ;  but  the  soldiers  inside  the  Capitol  were  besieged 
for  nearly  seven  months.  The  Celts,  who,  when  they  had 
entered  the  city,  found  many  of  the  noblest  old  men  sitting 
at  the  doors  of  their  houses  in  their  dresses  for  ceremonies, 
had  at  first  left  them  alone  ;  but  finally  they  could  not  resist 
killing  them.  Then  they  stole  anything  they  fancied,  and  at 
last  burned  the  city.  Still  the  Capitol  held  out.  The  rock 
on  which  it  was  built  was  steep.  But  it  was  only  saved,  on 
one  occasion,  by  the  cackling  of  the  sacred  geese,  which 
warned  the  wearied  soldiers  one  dark  night  when  they  had 
fallen  asleep.  At  length  news  came  to  the  Celtic  general 
that  his  homeland  was  being  besieged,  and  so  he  was  glad  to 
accept  a  sum  of  money  to  leave  Rome. 

So  Rome  was  free  once  more.  The  soldiers  and  women 
and  children  returned,  and  there  were  some  who  were  so 
frightened  that  they  wished  to  leave  the  city  altogether  ;  but 
the  brave  soldier  Camillus  persuaded  them  to  stay  and  build 
the  city  again.  So  very  rapidly  and  with  little  order  houses 
and  streets  sprang  up,  and  it  was  owing  to  this  that  Roman 
consuls  in  later  times  had  to  pass  laws  to  see  that  carts  and 
carriages  did  not  cause  constant  stoppages  in  these  narrow, 
inconvenient  streets. 

It  was  a  terrible  thing  for  Rome  to  be  burnt ;  but  it 
affected  its  history  very  little  except  in  one  way.  All  the 
records  of  Roman  history  were  burnt  in  the  city  fire,  and  it  is 
owing  to  this  that  it  is  very  difficult  to  say  what  is  the  true 
story  of  Rome  before  then.  The  year  390  B.C.,  therefore,  marks 
the  time  from  which  we  begin  to  know  more  certainly  how 
the  city  of  Rome  fared  in  its  growth  from  a  tiny  shepherds' 
town  to  the  chief  city  of  the  world.  In  no  other  way  did 
the  burning  of  Rome  produce  any  effect  which  is  worth 
remembering. 


CHAPTER   XI 

ROME  MISTRESS  OF  ITALY 

The  burning  of  Rome  was  not  the  last  Italy  heard  of  the  Celts. 
They  had  invaded  Italy  before,  and  for  many  years  afterwards 
they  continued  to  make  sudden  marches  against  different  cities 
where  they  thought  they  could  find  things  to  steal.  The  dis- 
tances they  marched  would  be  wonderful  even  now  for  a  large 
army ;  but  for  these  days  when  there  were  no  trains  and  no 
way  to  carry  their  baggage  except  on  horseback  they  must 
have  been  extraordinary.  Twenty  years  after  the  burning 
of  Rome  Camillus  defeated  them  at  Alba.  A  few  years 
later  another  Roman  general  marched  out  against  them ;  but 
the  Celts  seem  to  have  learned  to  fear  their  enemies,  for  they 
marched  past  them  towards  the  South.  They  were  again 
defeated  by  the  Romans  a  few  years  afterwards  ;  but  in  spite 
of  this  we  find  this  extraordinary  people  only  eight  years 
later  calmly  settling  down  for  the  winter  at  Alba.  They 
enjoyed  themselves  in  their  own  way  by  sudden  marches  on 
various  cities,  where  they  took  everything  of  value,  and  then 
returned  to  the  Alban  hill.  But  the  next  year  the  son  of  the 
brave  Camillus,  who  was  now  dead,  led  a  great  army  against 
them  and  made  them  go  away. 

There  is  a  wise  saying  of  an  old  Roman  that  manliness, 
upon  which  every  Roman  prided  himself,  grows  in  opposition, 
that  is  to  say,  when  a  man  has  to  struggle  hard  he  will 
probably  become  manly.  If  a  nation  knows  it  is  in  danger 
of  being  attacked  by  an  enemy  it  must  make  it  watchful, 
and  this  is  another  thing  which  the  Romans  liked,  watchful- 
ness.    One  result,  then,  of  these  constant  troubles  with  the 

102 


ROME  MISTRESS  OF  ITALY  103 

Celts,  and  there  were  troubles  from  other  peoples  too,  was 
to  make  the  Romans  ever  stronger  and  more  manly.  We 
must  remember  this,  for  it  helps  to  explain  why  the  city  of 
Rome  became  mistress  of  Italy  rather  than  any  other  of  the 
cities.  Of  course,  Rome  had  a  very  strong  position.  It  was 
too  far  from  the  coast  to  be  attacked  by  ships  of  war.  It 
was  in  the  centre  of  Italy,  and  so  could  march  north  or  south 
with  equal  ease,  and  thus  meet  one  of  its  enemies  at  a  time, 
instead  of  having  them  all  marching  against  it  at  once. 
And  also  it  was  strongly  built  on  hills.  The  Celts  had  taken 
it  very  easily ;  but  it  would  have  been  very  different  if  the 
Roman  soldiers  had  stayed  to  defend  the  walls. 

We  have  seen  that  by  the  time  the  Celts  took  Rome 
the  Etruscan  power  had  been  almost  completely  crushed. 
This  does  not  mean  that  the  Etruscan  cities  could  fight  no 
more,  or  that  there  were  not  still  some  of  them  which,  being 
far  from  Rome,  still  remained  free.  But  while  the  Etruscans 
had  been  so  strong  long  ago  that  they  had  put  Rome  to 
shame  after  Tarquin  the  Proud  had  been  put  off  the  throne, 
now  the  best  they  could  hope  for  was  to  gain  a  victory  for 
a  moment  over  a  small  band  of  the  Romans.  When  the 
great  Roman  army  marched  against  them  they  were  beaten. 

Some  years  before  the  son  of  Camillus  drove  the  Celts 
from  the  Alban  hill  the  whole  of  South  Etruria,  the  country 
of  the  Etruscans,  was  Roman,  with  Roman  fortresses  on  its 
boundaries  and  Roman  people  living  in  its  towns.  But  a 
little  later  the  Etruscans,  who  became  more  and  more  angry 
as  they  saw  the  Roman  power  creeping  always  farther  into 
their  country,  rebelled.  Three  of  the  great  Etruscan  towns 
sent  their  soldiers  against  the  Roman  army,  and  when  they 
had  taken  some  men  in  the  battle,  they  cut  them  to  pieces 
in  the  market-place.  This  horrible  act  was  soon  punished, 
for  in  the  year  that  the  Celts  settled  on  the  Alban  hill  the 
Romans  took  from  one  of  these  cities,  C^ere,  half  of  its  land 
and  put  the  city  under  Rome.  The  other  towns  were  forced 
to  say  they  would  do  nothing  against  Rome  for  a  long  time. 


104  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

The  Etruscan  power  sank  lower  and  lower:  the  Celts  were 
taking  part  of  what  had  been  their  land  in  the  North,  and  the 
Etruscan  rulers  of  the  cities  which  were  free  ruled  so  badly 
that  the  lower  people  fought  against  them,  and  the  rulers 
asked  the  Romans  to  help  them.  They  did  ;  but  the  cities 
were  not  free  any  longer  afterwards. 

The  Growth  of  Roman  Poaver 

All  this  time  the  Romans  were  growing  in  power  in  the 
South  too,  so  that  by  the  time  that  she  was  really  mistress 
of  Etruria  she  was  mistress  of  all  Italy.  But  this  was  at  the 
cost  of  many  battles.  The  Latins  did  not  at  all  like  the 
Roman  position  in  the  Latin  League.  We  have  seen  that 
it  seemed  a  very  fair  agreement ;  but  it  really  came  to  mean 
that  Rome  used  all  the  strength  of  the  Latin  cities  as  if  it  was 
her  own.  The  Romans  even  took  care  to  keep  the  Latin 
cities  under  them,  for  when  they  made  an  agreement  with 
Carthage  for  the  Latins,  the  Carthaginians  promised  not  to 
fight  against  the  Latin  cities  if  they  remained  friendly  to 
Rome,  and  if  any  of  them  rebelled  it  would  put  them  again 
under  Rome. 

This  was  very  bitter  to  the  cities  of  Latium,  but  so  many 
of  them  had  attempted  to  rebel  against  Rome,  between  the 
burning  of  the  city  and  the  year  of  this  agreement,  and  each 
had  been  conquered  with  so  little  difficulty,  that  it  is  hardly 
to  be  wondered  at  that  they  did  not  rebel  at  once  again. 
But  the  ill-feel) :ig  was  there,  and  apparently  the  Romans 
knew  it.  Before,  however,  the  Latins  attempted  to  fight 
against  Rome,  that  city  went  to  war  with  a  very  powerful 
race  of  hillmen,  who  lived  to  the  south  of  Rome,  in  part  of 
the  high  land  which  runs  through  the  heart  of  Italy. 

Many  years  before  bands  of  these  hillmen  had  poured  down 
into  the  plain  of  Campania,  south  of  Latium.  They  seized  the 
large  and  important  towns  Capua,  which  had  before  belonged 
to  the  Etruscans,  and  Cumse,  which  was  a  Greek  settlement. 


ROME  MISTRESS  OF  ITALY 


105 


These  Samnites,  Campanians  as  we  may  call  them,  settled 
down  in  the  new  country,  and  very  soon  became  less  hardy 
and  brave  than  their  relatives  who  still  lived  in  the  hills. 
But  the  hillmen  came  down  again  and  again,  and  the 
Campanians  began  to  fear  them  so  much  that  at  last  they 
sent  to  the  Romans  to  ask  for 
help.  The  Romans  compelled 
the  Samnites  to  make  peace. 

Whether  they  would  have 
been  so  content  to  make  peace 
we  do  not  know,  if  they  had 
not  feared  a  rebellion  of  the 
Latin  cities.  The  storm  quickly 
burst.  The  Campanians, jealous 
of  the  Roman  power,  which 
they  had  been  so  glad  to  call 
upon  when  they  were  in  danger, 
joined  the  Latin  cities,  and  the 
position  of  the  Roman  army 
seemed  almost  hopeless.  They 
had  gone  South  to  help  the 
Campanians,  and  now  the  armies 
of  the  Latin  cities  stood  be- 
tween them  and  home.  The 
Latins,  on  their  side,  seemed  to 
feel  that,  if  they  were  ever  to  be 
free,  this  was  their  only  chance. 

At  the  terrible  battles  of  Mount  Vesuvius  and  Trifanum 
the  great  army  of  the  Latins  and  Campanians  was  thoroughly 
beaten,  and  in  the  next  two  years  the  Roman  army  completely 
conquered  all  the  towns  that  still  held  out.  The  league  of 
Latin  cities  came  to  an  end  for  ever. 

These  victories  made  Rome  mistress  of  the  plains  of 
Latium  and  Campania.  In  some  cases  Rome  made  agree- 
ment with  the  separate  cities,  but  other  towns  had  a  far 
different    fate.      The    walls    were    pulled    down,    and    the 


A    SAMNITE    WARRIOR 

(From  a  painting  on  an  ancient  vase 
in  the  Louvre). 


106  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

inhabitants  were  sent  away  from  their  homes.  Or  they 
were  made  into  colonies,  and  these  were  dotted  about  over 
the  country  so  as  to  protect  Rome  against  the  attacks  of  her 
enemies. 

The  colonies  were  really  very  often  fortresses,  and  they 
could  be  used  to  gather  Roman  armies  together.  Thus 
Fregellae,  the  name  of  a  colony  on  the  road  called  the 
Latin  Way,  was  on  the  river  Liris,  and  therefore  would 
protect  an  army  wishing  to  cross  it  on  the  way  to  Cam- 
pania. This  colony  would  be  like  a  Roman  sword  between 
Latium  and  the  Campanians.  The  Roman  army  could 
march  swiftly  down  this  road,  and  be  quite  sure  that  food 
and  all  that  was  necessary  would  be  ready  for  them  in  the 
colony. 

We  can  easily  see  from  the  wise  way  Rome  did  its  work 
that  there  must  have  been  many  great  and  wise  men  in  the 
city,  and  if  the  acts  of  the  Romans  sometimes  seem  very 
cruel,  we  must  remember  that  they  thought,  as  the  cities 
around  them  very  clearly  thought  also,  that  against  such  wild 
and  savage  fighters  as  the  Celts  and  hillmen  not  Rome  alone 
or  any  one  city  could  be  successful,  but  only  Rome  with 
the  armies  of  the  Italian  cities  faithfully  helping  them.  So 
the  battles  in  Latium  continued  until  the  last  resistance  was 
finally  broken  down,  when  Privernum  was  taken  and  its  leader 
was  executed  in  Rome. 

Only  a  few  years  after  this,  war  broke  out  once  more  with 
the  Samnites.  The  hillmen  had  objected  to  the  Romans 
making  colonies  on  the  very  borders  of  their  land,  but  they 
had  not  sufficient  wisdom  to  object  strongly  enough  and  at 
the  right  time.  The  Romans  had  therefore  made  themselves 
very  strong  in  Latium  before  the  second  struggle  broke  out. 
The  story  of  this  war  is  not  very  interesting,  but  the  Romans 
suffered  one  shameful  defeat  in  it  which  we  must  mention. 
At  first,  however,  they  were  everywhere  victorious,  so  much 
so  that  the  Samnites  even  grew  so  frightened  that  they  asked 
the  Romans  to  be  at  peace.     The  Romans  refused,  and  now 


ROME  MISTRESS  OF  ITALY  107 

the  Samnites  fought  even  more  vigorously,  as  men  will  when 
they  have  nothing  to  hope. 

Misled  by  false  news,  the  Romans  were  led  to  march 
through  a  place  which  was  shut  in  on  both  sides  by  high 
hills.  The  entrance  to  this  place  was  very  narrow  indeed, 
and  so  was  the  outlet  from  it.  It  seemed  very  terrible  and 
mysterious  as  the  army  marched  quickly  through,  but  they 
were  thoroughly  frightened  when  they  found  at  the  outlet 
a  great  barrier  with  hundreds  of  Samnite  soldiers  behind  it. 
Quickly  they  marched  back,  only  to  find  that  the  entrance 
had  been  stopped  in  the  same  way.  On  the  hill-tops,  on 
both  sides,  they  now  saw  the  Samnite  soldiers.  They  could 
not  move  backward  or  forward.  They  could  not  fight  as  they 
had  been  used  to.     And  so  they  were  compelled  to  give  in. 

This  was  bad  enough,  but  it  was  not  all.  The  Samnites 
made  the  Roman  generals  promise  to  destroy  the  strong  town 
Fregellae  and  another  colony,  and  to  make  a  league  with  the 
Samnites.  Then  the  Samnites  made  the  disgraced  Roman 
soldiers  put  their  weapons  on  the  ground,  and  go  '  under  the 
yoke,'  i.e.  creep  under  a  spear  which  rested  upon  two  other 
spears  stuck  upright  in  the  ground.  This  was  the  most 
shameful  thing  that  could  happen  to  any  soldier,  for  it  meant 
that  he  who  went  under  the  yoke  owned  that  the  others 
were  completely  his  master. 

The  conquered  generals  had  promised  to  do  what  the 
Samnites  had  asked,  and  so  had  been  allowed  to  go  back  to 
Rome  with  the  army.  But  when  they  told  the  Romans 
what  they  had  agreed  to  do,  the  Romans  were  very  angry 
and  refused  to  do  these  things.  This  was,  of  course,  very  dis- 
honourable, for  if  the  generals  had  not  agreed  they  would 
not  have  been  allowed  to  go  home. 

But  the  Romans  thought  that  they  could  not  give  up  all 
that  they  had  won  just  because  two  of  their  generals  had 
fallen  into  a  trap.  They  prepared  to  go  to  war  again.  A 
new  Roman  army  was  formed  quickly,  and  the  Samnites 
were  defeated,  and  themselves  made  to  pass  under  the  yoke. 


108 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


The  Romans  must  have  enjoyed  paying  the  Samnites  back 
for  the  shame  they  had  made  them  suffer. 

The  battle  was  at  Luceria,  over  the  Apennine  mountains, 
in  the  south-west  of  Italy,  and  the  town  was  made  into  a 
fortress  to  protect  the  Roman  power  there.     Other  victories 


A    VIEW    ON    THE    APPIAN    WAY    AS    IT    IS    TO-DAY 


followed,  and  so  the  Samnites,  by  trapping  the  Romans,  had 
not  destroyed  the  power  of  Rome  as  they  thought,  they  had 
simply  made  it  more  powerful  still.  For  now  she  had  a  strong 
colony  to  the  east  of  the  country  of  the  Samnites,  A  great 
Roman  road,  at  this  time,  was  built  to  Capua.  It  was  the 
famous  Appian  Way.  Good  roads  joining  far-off  colonies, 
colonies  in  strong  towns  in  a  district  which  had  been  made 
Roman,  these  were  the  chief  ways  in  which  more  and'«more 
of  Italy  fell  into  the  power  of  Rome. 


ROME  MISTRESS  OF  ITALY  109 

When  the  war  with  the  Samnites  was  over  at  length,  after 
twenty  years,  it  might  have  been  thought  that  the  Romans 
would  have  been  finally  acknowledged  as  rulers  of  Italy, 
especially  as  their  wisdom  in  peace  was  even  greater  than 
their  courage  and  skill  in  war.  For  the  Romans  very  seldom 
were  cruel  to  their  enemies.  They  generally  offered  to  let 
them  enjoy  some  of  the  privileges  of  being  a  Roman  citizen, 
if  they  promised  to  help  their  conquerors  and  to  be  faithful 
to  them.  Now,  after  the  war  with  the  Samnites  more 
fortresses  were  built,  and  more  of  those  strong  straight  roads 
to  carry  the  Roman  armies  swiftly  from  one  to  another. 

Yet  the  Samnites  could  not  easily  give  up  their  freedom 
and  acknowledge  the  Romans  their  masters,  and  this  is  what 
those  strong  towns  up  and  down  Italy  meant.  They  were 
really  chains.  Whenever  and  wherever  the  Samnites  wished 
to  leave  their  hill  country,  they  found  a  strong  Roman  colony 
in  their  way.  The  Etruscans  had  recently  rebelled  against 
the  Romans,  and  now  they  made  up  their  minds  to  try  once 
more,  but  this  time  they  intended  to  join  with  the  Samnites. 
The  Romans  found  another  enemy  marching  against  them. 
The  result  of  this  was  that  the  Romans  had  to  fight  armies 
in  the  far  South  of  Italy,  in  Campania,  and  in  Etruria.  But 
although  there  were  times  when  it  looked  as  if  the  future 
mistress  of  the  world  would  be  destroyed,  Rome  came  out 
of  this  terrible  war  victorious  once  more.  Again  colonies 
were  settled  over  the  conquered  country,  one  being  far  south 
on  the  Appian  Way,  and  no  fewer  than  twenty  thousand 
colonists  were  sent  there. 

In  this  way  the  South  was  made  Roman,  the  two  large 
states  in  the  South  of  Italy,  Apulia  and  Lucania,  being  put 
under  her.  She  was  not  so  strong  that  wars  could  not  arise 
again  ;  but,  with  the  exception  of  the  struggle  with  the  Greeks 
in  Italy  (which  must  be  told  in  the  next  chapter),  almost 
the  whole  of  Italy  had  now  been  conquered  by  Rome.  She 
had  fought  for  several  hundred  years,  but  now,  in  the  year 
290  B.C.,  when  strong  towns  in  almost  every  part  of  the  country 


no  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

reminded  men  of  the  Roman  power,  she  was  practically  mistress 
of  the  whole  of  Italy. 

The  practical  orderly  spirit  of  the  Romans  had  made  itself 
felt.  The  clever  men  in  the  city,  ruling  while  their  brothers 
fought  in  the  distant  wars,  or  wisely  deciding  what  to  do  in 
the  many  difficult  questions  that  arose — with  whom  they 
should  make  friends,  whom  they  should  treat  mildly,  whom 
they  should  punish  harshly — had  really  made  Rome  the  great 
city  she  was. 

The  Romans  had  not  the  imagination  of  the  Celts, 
nor  the  artistic  feeling  and  curiosity  into  the  reasons  of 
things  which  marked  the  Greeks,  but  they  had  a  strong 
practical  common  sense,  a  wisdom  which  was  more  valuable 
than  either  in  fitting  them  to  rule  over  many  peoples.  Now 
this  strong  young  nation  is  to  be  brought  face  to  face  with 
the  old  and  splendid  Greek  race.  Perhaps  one  might  regret 
that  the  Romans  won  if  it  were  not  that,  by  that  fact,  much 
of  the  beauty  and  splendour  of  ancient  Greece  has  been 
preserved  for  all  time,  for  peoples  in  the  most  distant  ages  to 
enjoy  and  grow  better  through  them. 


CHAPTER   XII 

ROME  AND  CARTHAGE 

Last  of  all  the  peoples  in  the  South  of  Italy  whom  the 
Romans  fought  and  conquered  were  the  Greeks.  For  a  long 
time  the  Romans  left  them  alone,  for  they  guessed  that  the 
Greek  cities  of  Italy  would  ask  help  from  other  Greeks  in 
Greece  proper  or  some  of  the  Greek  colonies.  This  is  what 
actually  happened.  One  of  the  chief  Greek  towns  in  South 
Italy  was  Tarentum.  It  was  built  by  men  from  Sparta  in 
the  days  when  so  many  Greeks  sailed  away  from  Greece 
proper  and  settled  in  Italy.  It  was  a  large  and  beautiful 
town,  but  for  many  years  before  it  actually  quarrelled  with 
Rome  it  had  been  ruled  very  badly.  It  was  not  like  Sparta, 
an  aristocracy,  but  was  a  democracy  of  the  worst  sort.  The 
people  had  no  idea  of  keeping  their  tempers  and  acting 
wisely.  When  they  were  angry  they  would  do  anything  to 
take  revenge  on  their  enemies,  and  never  thought  whether 
it  was  just  or  not.  They  were  very  jealous  of  the  Romans, 
and  afraid  that  they  would  conquer  them  as  they  had  con- 
quered the  other  peoples  of  Italy. 

But  instead  of  going  to  war  in  a  straightforward  way  with 
Rome,  the  people  of  Tarentum  did  a  very  mean  and  wrong 
thing.  A  Roman  fleet  had  sailed  into  their  harbour,  and  was 
lying  there  peacefully.  The  people  of  Tarentum  rushed 
suddenly  upon  the  ships.  The  Romans  were  taken  by  surprise, 
and  five  of  the  ships  were  easily  taken  by  the  Tarentines.  The 
men  on  them  were  either  killed  or  sold  into  slavery.  Then 
the  people  of  Tarentum,  frightened  of  Rome,  sent  across  the 

Adriatic  Sea  to  the  little  kingdom  of  Epirus  to  ask  its  king, 

111 


112 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


who  was  a  Greek  and  a  relation  of  Alexander  the  Great,  to 
come  and  help  them  against  Rome.  Pyrrhus  was  the  name 
of  this  king,  and  he  was  so  handsome  and  brave,  and  such  a 
fine  soldier,  that  it  has  often  been  said  that  he  was  nearly  as 
wonderful  a  man  as  Alexander  the  Great.     But  this  is  not 

quite  true.  He  was  a  fine  soldier, 
and  could  win  battles,  but  he  had 
not  the  imagination  to  make  much 
use  of  them.  He  would  win  at  all 
costs,  but  often  lost  so  many  men 
that  winning  did  not  seem  of  any 
use.  Even  now  we  speak  of  a 
victory  or  a  success  of  any  kind 
which  is  not  of  much  use  to  the 
winner  as  a  '  Pyrrhic  Victory.' 

The  First  Fight  between 
Greeks  and  Romans 

Pyrrhus  in  his  little  kingdom 
of  Epirus,  which  was  really  under 
the  Macedonian  power,  was  glad 
of  the  chance  of  going  over  the  sea 
to  fight  for  the  people  of  Taren- 
tum.  He  collected  an  army,  and 
he  took  with  him  some  elephants, 
and  crossed  the  sea  to  Tarentum. 
Near  the  town  he  fought  with  a 
Roman  army  under  one  of  the 
consuls.  The  Romans  had  never  seen  elephants  before,  and 
partly  because  of  the  strangeness  of  an  army  like  that  of 
Pyrrhus,  they  were  defeated.  It  was  the  first  time  that  a 
Roman  army  had  fought  against  Greek  soldiers,  and  the 
Greeks  won.  But  it  was  only  an  accidental  victory,  and  the 
Romans  were  much  too  used  to  winning  and  too  sure  of  their 
own  strength  to  think  much  of  it.  When  Pyrrhus  sent  a 
messenger  to  the  Senate  to  try  to  arrange  conditions  of  peace, 


PYRRHUS,    KING    OF    EPIRUS 

(From  a  statue  at  Rome). 


ROME  AND  CARTHAGE  113 

one  of  the  Senators,  Appius  Claudius,  who  was  old  and  blind, 
persuaded  the  Senate  to  send  a  message  back  to  Pyrrhus, 
telling  him  proudly  that  the  Romans  never  talked  of  peace 
with  foreign  soldiers  on  her  land. 

So  next  year  another  battle  was  fought,  and  again 
it  was  a  '  Pyrrhic  Victory,'  and  Pyrrhus  then  left  Italy 
and  crossed  to  Sicily,  where  the  Greek  colonies  were 
fighting  once  more  with  the  Carthaginians.  He  helped  the 
Greek  cities  there,  but  as  he  himself  seemed  to  treat  them 
as  a  conqueror,  they  turned  against  him,  and  so  he  went 
back  to  Italy.  Once  more  he  fought  against  the  Romans,  but 
this  time  he  was  defeated  and  went  back  to  Greece.  Three 
years  afterwards  he  was  killed  in  a  fight,  after  taking  part  in 
several  of  the  struggles  which  were  still  going  on  among  the 
Greek  states. 

After  his  departure  from  Italy,  Tarentum  soon  became  an 
'  ally '  of  Rome,  which  sounded  as  though  she  was  still  free, 
but  she  had  to  pull  down  her  walls  and  join  Rome  in  her 
battles  if  she  was  asked  to  do  so.  In  a  short  time  Rome 
had  conquered  the  whole  of  South  Italy.  She  soon  began 
to  think  about  conquering  the  island  of  Sicily  too.  This 
island  is  so  near  to  Italy  that  it  would  be  very  dangerous 
for  the  Italian  state  if  it  belonged  to  any  one  else. 

At  the  time  when  Rome  had  won  all  the  South  of  Italy, 
and  began  to  think  about  conquering  Sicily,  the  island  was 
still  divided  between  the  colonies  of  Carthage  and  those 
of  Greece.  For  seventy  years  after  the  Greeks  had  won 
the  great  victory  of  Himera  over  the  Carthaginians  under 
Hamilcar,  there  had  been  peace  between  the  two  peoples 
in  Sicily,  But  the  Carthaginians  had  never  forgotten 
Hamilcar.  Seventy  years  after  his  death  a  quarrel  broke 
out  between  two  Greek  towns  in  Sicily.  One  of  them 
asked  the  help  of  the  Carthaginians,  and  Carthage  gladly 
sent  help  over  to  fight  against  the  town  of  Selinus.  The 
chief  ruler  in  Carthage  was  Hannibal,  the  grandson  of 
Hamilcar.     He  was  very  pleased  at  the  idea  of  fighting  the 

H 


114 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  A¥ORLD 


Greeks  in  Sicily,  and  winning,  as  he  hoped,  a  great^  victory. 
He  himself  collected  a  great  army  from  Africa  and  Spain,  for 
the  South  of  Spain  had  been  conquered  by  Carthage,  and 
crossed  over  to  Sicily.  With  his  great  army  he  destroyed 
Selinus,  killed  thousands  of  its  people,  and  then  marched  on 

to  Himera  to  take  revenge  for  the 
defeat  of  his  grandfather  seventy 
years  before.  Again  he  won  a  great 
victory,  and  destroyed  Himera.  His 
soldiers  murdered  the  people  in  the 
streets  until  Hannibal  gave  the 
order  to  stop.  But  the  people  who 
had  not  been  killed  immediately 
were  treated  even  worse.  They 
were  taken  to  the  place  where 
Hamilcar  had  last  been  seen  and 
there  killed  as  a  sacrifice. 

The  Carthaginians,  in  spite  of 
their  wealth  and  power,  were  never 
really  civilized.  They  offered  sacri- 
fices of  men  and  women  and  even 
children  to  their  gods.  Hannibal 
now  went  home  to  Carthage,  but 
four  years  afterwards  was  persuaded 
to  go  again  to  Sicily.  This  time  he 
besieged  the  town  of  Agrigentum, 
even  pulling  up  gravestones  out- 
side the  town  for  his  men  to 
stand  on  when  they  threw  their 
weapons  into  the  city.  But  the 
plague  broke  out  among  his  soldiers. 

Hannibal  thought  this  was  a  punishment  from  the  gods  for 
his  having  touched  the  graves  of  the  dead,  and  he  immediately 
offered  a  sacrifice  of  a  child,  hoping  that  the  gods  would  forgive 
him.  But  he  fell  ill  himself  and  died,  and  in  the  fights  which 
followed  the  Greeks  won.     For  one  hundred  and  fifty  years 


A    SOLDIER    OF    ANCIENT 
CARTHAGE 

(From  a  statuette). 


ROME  AND  CARTHAGE  115 

after  this  the  Greeks  and  Carthaginians  were  at  war  in  Sicily, 
though  sometimes  peace  was  made  for  some  years.  Then  at 
last  Rome  was  ready  to  interfere  and  take  Sicily  for  herself. 

In  any  case  it  was  certain  that  now  that  Rome  had 
become  so  strong  she  would  have  a  struggle  with  Carthage, 
the  only  other  great  power  in  the  West,  to  see  which  should 
become  in  the  end  the  greater  power.  The  struggle  began 
over  Sicily,  but  after  the  island  was  won  by  the  Romans,  it 
went  on  for  more  than  a  hundred  years  until  Rome  had 
won  all  her  lands  from  Carthage,  and  completely  destroyed 
that  proud  city  itself. 

A  town  in  Sicily  called  Messana  (and  which  is  now 
named  Messina)  had  been  taken  by  some  rough  soldiers 
from  the  South  of  Italy.  They  were  really  robbers  and 
had  no  right  to  the  town.  The  people  in  the  country 
near  were  very  much  afraid  of  them,  and  Hiero,  the 
ruler  of  the  great  Greek  colony  in  Sicily  called  Syracuse, 
made  up  his  mind  to  fight  against  Messana  and  drive  the 
robbers  out.  The  robbers  asked  help  of  Rome  and  of 
Carthage.  The  Romans  knew  that  they  ought  to  help 
Hiero,  who  was  their  ally,  but  they  were  so  afraid  of  Carthage 
getting  power  in  Messana  that  they  said  they  would  help 
the  robbers  there  instead.  But  some  of  the  robbers  let 
Carthaginian  soldiers  into  Messana.  These  fought  against 
the  Roman  soldiers,  and  so  the  great  struggle  began. 

Rome's  First  Ships 

The  Carthaginians  were  so  great  by  sea  that  the  Romans 
knew  that  it  was  on  the  sea  they  must  fight  if  they  were  to 
win.  But  so  far  Rome  had  never  had  a  fleet.  The  Romans 
knew  nothing  either  about  building  big  ships.  The  only 
ships  they  had  were  the  old-fashioned  Greek  boats  with  three 
rows  of  oars.  The  Greeks  and  Etruscans  in  Italy  did  know 
something  about  shipbuilding,  and  as  these  people  were 
now  really  part  of  the  Roman  state,  the  Romans  got  them  to 


116  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

help  them  to  build  new  ships.  A  Carthaginian  ship  which 
was  wrecked  and  washed  up  on  the  coast  of  Italy  was 
examined  and  copied.  A  whole  forest  of  trees  was  cut  down, 
and  a  fleet  of  a  hundred  ships  was  made. 

But  the  Romans  did  not  yet  know  anything  about  managing 
ships,  and  for  many  years  after  this  many  of  their  ships  were 
wrecked  in  storms  because  the  sailors  did  not  know  what  to  do 
when  danger  or  difficulty  came.  But  they  fought  against  the 
ships  of  Carthage,  and  won  great  victories.  They  managed 
to  do  this  by  fighting  at  sea  much  as  they  would  have 
done  on  land.  Each  Roman  ship  had  a  kind  of  bridge  with 
a  great  sharp  hook  at  the  end,  and  when  a  Carthaginian  ship 
came  near,  the  bridge  was  let  down  over  its  side,  the  hook 
caught  it  and  held  it  fast,  and  then  the  Romans  swarmed 
over  the  bridge  on  to  the  enemy's  ship,  and  there  fought  a 
hand-to-hand  fight. 

In  the  first  sea-fight  between  Rome  and  Carthage  fifty 
Carthaginian  ships  were  destroyed.  Then  the  Carthaginians 
would  fight  no  more,  and  the  Romans  sailed  proudly  home 
carrying  the  brass  figureheads  of  their  enemy's  ships,  which 
they  fastened  to  a  pillar  which  was  put  up  in  the  Forum, 
the  great  market-place  at  Rome,  in  memory  of  Rome's  first 
victory  on  the  sea.  Many  more  ships  were  built  after  this, 
and  in  a  later  battle  we  know  that  there  were  at  least 
three  hundred  ships  on  each  side.  After  several  years  of 
fighting  at  sea  and  in  Sicily,  the  Romans  made  up  their 
minds  to  land  two  great  armies  in  the  north  of  Africa,  and 
fight  Carthage  at  home.  After  another  great  victory  at  sea 
the  armies  landed.  The  Carthaginians  then  sent  messengers 
to  discuss  conditions  of  peace.  But  the  Romans  said  they 
must  not  only  give  up  to  them  the  islands  of  Sardinia  and 
Sicily,  but  they  must  also  destroy  their  own  fleet,  and  send 
ships  to  help  the  Roman  fleet  when  required. 

The  Carthaginians  were  naturally  very  angry  at  such 
a  request,  and  determined  to  fight  the  matter  out.  The 
Romans  were  so  confident  that  they  called  one  of  the  armies 


ROME  AND  CARTHAGE  117 

back  to  Italy.  The  other  was  left  under  a  brave  commander 
called  Regulus.  He  had  a  large  army,  but  the  Carthaginians 
got  together  a  still  larger  one,  and  they  had  large  numbers  of 
horse-soldiers.  Regulus  might  have  got  horse-soldiers  for 
himself  from  some  tribes  which  were  in  rebellion  against 
Carthage,  but  he  did  not,  and  when  the  fighting  took  place 
the  Romans  were  defeated.  Regulus  was  taken  prisoner,  and 
later  killed.  A  story  is  told,  and  it  may  be  true,  that  he  was 
sent  to  Rome  with  messages  for  the  Senate,  but  he  had 
promised  to  give  himself  up  again  to  the  Carthaginians  if 
the  conditions  of  peace  which  the  Carthaginians  offered 
were  not  agreed  to  by  the  Romans.  It  is  told  that  Regulus 
himself  persuaded  the  Senate  to  say '  No'  to  these  conditions, 
for  the  people  of  Carthage  were  now,  in  their  turn,  asking 
too  much.  So  Regulus  kept  his  word,  and  went  back  to  be 
killed. 

After  this,  too,  the  Romans  were  very  unfortunate  in  their 
fights  with  the  Carthaginians  on  the  sea.  The  fighting  went 
on  for  years.  Altogether  the  '  First  Punic  War,'  as  it  was 
called,  lasted  seventeen  years.  In  the  end  peace  was  made, 
and  Carthage  agreed  to  give  up  Sicily,  and  the  small  islands 
near  it.  Soon  afterwards,  when  Carthage  was  having  a  great 
deal  of  trouble  with  some  of  the  paid  soldiers  who  had 
rebelled  against  her,  the  Romans  suddenly  seized  Sardinia 
and  Corsica  too.  At  the  time  the  Carthaginians  could  not 
do  anything,  but  Hamilcar,  their  ruler  who  had  made  the 
peace  with  Rome,  was  now  filled  with  a  deadly  hatred.  He 
devoted  the  rest  of  his  life  to  revenge. 

He  saw  that  he  would  have  a  better  chance  of  getting 
together  an  army  of  splendid  soldiers  if  he  went  over  to  Spain. 
The  people  of  Carthage  were  rather  tired  of  the  struggle  with 
Rome,  and  could  not  understand  Hamilcar 's  feeling  of  deadly 
hatred  for  her.  They  were  quite  pleased  when  he  proposed  to  go 
to  Spain,  and  devote  himself  to  getting  together  an  army  there. 
There  were  already  many  Carthaginian  colonies  in  that  country, 
and  Hamilcar  conquered  more  and  more  of  the  land  until  there 


118 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


was  a  large  new  kingdom  there.  He  drilled  the  Spaniards, 
and  made  them  into  fine  soldiers.  For  years  he  did  this, 
content  to  prepare  his  revenge  and  leave  it  to  others  to  carry 
out.  When  his  little  boy  was  only  nine  years  of  age  he 
told  him  solemnly  all  the  wrongs  which  Rome  had  done  to 

Carthage,  and  the  boy  swore  an  oath 
to  avenge  his  country  when  he  had 
grown  to  be  a  man. 

Hannibal  the  Great 

The  boy,  whose  name  was  Han- 
nibal, grew  up  to  be  one  of  the 
greatest  soldiers  who  have  ever  lived. 
After  his  father's  death,  when  he 
himself  was  a  young  man  of  twenty- 
six,  he  fought  against  Rome ;  and 
though  Rome  was  now  a  great 
nation,  and  Carthage  was  fast  going 
to  ruin,  he  almost  won  in  the  fight  by 
his  immense  cleverness  and  courage. 
But  he  made  two  mistakes.  He 
thought  that  the  people  of  Italy 
whom  the  Romans  had  conquered 
would  be  glad  to  join  him  in  fighting 
them,  but  this  was  not  so,  for  the 
Italians  had  by  this  time  settled  down 
happily  under  Roman  rule.  He 
thought,  too,  that  the  people  of  Car- 
thage would  be  anxious  to  send  him 
help,  but  again  this  was  not  the  case. 
By  this  time  the  Roman  people  had  learned  all  about 
ships  and  shipping.  They  had  a  great  navy,  and  so  when 
the  moment  came  for  Hannibal  to  attack  them  he  chose  to 
do  it  by  land.  He  made  up  his  mind  to  lead  a  great  army 
out  of  Spain  into  Italy  across  the  Alps.  It  was  early  Spring 
when  the  army  began  its  march,  and  in  the  mountain  passes 


HANNIBAL 

(From  a  bust  in  the  Naples  Museum, 
said  to  be  a  portrait  of  Hannibal.     If 
it  is  not  Hannibal  himself,  it  repre- 
sents a  Carthaginian  general). 


ROME  AND  CARTHAGE  119 

the  weather  was  bitterly  cold.  The  men  who  guarded  them 
went  back  to  their  homes  at  night,  and  so  Hannibal  chose 
to  lead  his  army  across  in  the  darkness.  Nearly  all  his  horses 
and  elephants  carrying  the  baggage  slipped  down  the  steep 
precipices  and  were  killed.  Before  the  Alps  were  crossed, 
half  of  the  men  of  his  great  army  were  dead,  either  through 
falling  from  the  rocks  or  overcome  by  the  terrible  cold. 
The  other  half  arrived  in  the  plain  of  North  Italy,  tired  out, 
but  still  full  of  courage  and  ready  to  fight.  Hannibal  was 
suifering  from  a  terrible  soreness  of  the  eyes,  through  the 
great  cold,  and  one  eye  became  blind. 

The  Romans  did  not  know  anything  of  Hannibal's  plans 
until  he  had  nearly  reached  the  Alps.  Then  they  sent  an 
army  to  Spain  to  prevent  him  getting  any  more  men  or  food 
from  there,  and  for  ten  years  Hannibal  had  to  depend  on  what 
he  could  get  in  Italy.  For  he  stayed  altogether  fifteen  years 
in  that  country  fighting  desperately,  and  always  hoping  for 
the  help  from  Carthage,  which  came  at  last,  but  too  late. 
He  marched  from  the  North  to  the  South  of  Italy,  winning 
three  great  battles,  for  he  was  a  splendid  general,  and 
when  he  actually  got  the  Romans  to  fight,  he  often  won. 
At  the  battle  of  Cann«,  it  is  said  that  eighty  thousand 
Romans  were  killed,  and  that  Hannibal  sent  ten  thousand 
gold  rings  to  Carthage,  taken  from  the  fingers  of  the  dead 
Roman  nobles,  to  show  how  great  had  been  his  victory. 
It  was  a  dreadful  misfortune,  but  the  Roman  people  and 
Senate  never  lost  heart  for  a  moment.  New  soldiers  were 
enlisted,  and  the  defences  of  Rome  itself  were  made  stronger. 
Hannibal  was  never  able  to  take  Rome  itself,  and  for  years 
he  remained  in  the  South  of  Italy,  hoping  for  help  from  his 
brother  in  Spain  and  from  the  people  in  Carthage. 

At  the  same  time  Scipio,  a  brave  young  Roman  general, 
was  fighting  the  Carthaginians  in  Spain,  and  took  for  Rome 
their  capital  there,  the  great  town  called  New  Carthage. 
Hannibal's  brother  had  been  left  to  rule  in  Spain,  but 
Hannibal  was  always  hoping  that  he  would  be  able  to  come 


120 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


with  a  new  army  to  help  him  in  Italy.  At  last  he  came, 
but  was  met  by  a  Roman  army  in  the  North  of  Italy.  His 
army  was  destroyed,  and  he  himself  killed.  The  first  that 
Hannibal  heard  of  it  was  when  the  head  of  his  brother  was 
suddenly  thrown  into  his  camp.     It  was  a  terrible  warning, 

and  Hannibal,  full  of  grief  and  horror, 
cried,  *  I  see  the  doom  of  Carthage.' 

The  Romans,  too,  felt  that  this 
was  a  turning  point  in  the  struggle. 
They  went  nearly  mad  with  joy, 
crowding  to  their  temples  to  praise 
their  gods.  The  women,  dressed  in 
their  most  beautiful  clothes,  took 
their  children  with  them  to  join  in 
the  thanksgiving.  Hannibal  still 
waited  sadly  in  the  South  of  Italy, 
until  he  was  called  back  to  defend 
Carthage  itself.  Scipio  had  left  Spain, 
where  he  had  won  all  the  lands  be- 
longing to  the  Carthaginians,  and 
had  taken  an  army  into  North  Africa. 
The  Carthaginians  begged  Hannibal 
to  come  back  and  defend  them,  and 
so  after  fifteen  years  in  Italy  he  sailed 
away  to  his  own  country  again.  It  is 
said  that  he  cried  as  he  looked  back 
on  the  Italian  shore,  for  he  knew  that  he  would  never  now 
have  the  thing  which  he  had  spent  his  life  to  win. 

At  Zama,  near  Carthage,  he  fought  against  Scipio  and 
lost.  At  last  Hannibal  gave  up  all  hope.  He  himself 
advised  the  people  of  Carthage  to  make  peace  with  Rome. 
He  knew  that  there  was  now  no  hope  that  Carthage  should  be 
greater  than  Rome.  Hannibal  must  have  been  all  the  more 
sad  when  he  remembered  that  his  long  and  bitter  struggle 
with  Rome  would  make  the  Roman  people  harder  in  their 
conditions  of  peace. 


SCIPIO    AFRICANUS 

(From  a  bust  at  Rome  of  the  bril- 
liant young  general  who  was  called 
'  Africanus '  because  of  his  victori- 
ous campaigns  against  Carthage). 


ROME  AND  CARTHAGE  121 

These  were,  indeed,  terribly  hard  for  Carthage.  She 
had  to  give  up  her  navy,  except  a  few  warships.  Five 
hundred  of  the  ships  were  burnt  by  the  Romans,  under 
the  eyes  of  the  people  of  Carthage,  just  outside  the  har- 
bour. All  her  land  in  Spain  was  now  to  belong  to  Rome, 
and  each  year  for  fifty  years  she  must  pay  a  large  sum  of 
money  to  Rome  to  make  up  to  the  Romans  for  the  expenses 
of  the  war.  The  Carthaginians  had  to  give  up  all  their 
prisoners  too,  and  though  they  were  allowed  to  keep  their  own 
laws,  they  were  to  fight  against  the  enemies  of  Rome  when 
she  asked  them,  and  so  they  could  hardly  be  called  free  from 
this  time.  Carthage  had,  indeed,  hardly  made  good  use  of  her 
wealth  and  power,  but  it  is  impossible  not  to  feel  sorry  for 
her  fall.  So  ended  the  Punic  Wars.  Later  we  shall  see  how 
Carthage  dared  once  more  to  rise  up  against  Rome,  and  how 
she  was  burnt  to  the  ground.     Hannibal  was  dead  before  this. 

For  some  time  after  he  had  made  peace  with  Rome  he 
stayed  in  Carthage,  and  did  all  he  could  to  bring  order  and  pros- 
perity to  the  city.  He  found  that  when  the  affairs  of  the  city 
were  properly  managed,  the  money  could  be  paid  each  year 
to  Rome,  and  yet  less  need  be  taken  from  the  people  in  taxes. 
But  some  of  the  people  said  that  Hannibal  only  wanted  to 
make  them  rich,  so  that  he  could  make  them  fight  Rome  again. 
They  even  told  the  Romans  that  he  was  plotting  with  their 
enemies,  and  messengers  were  sent  from  Rome  to  Carthage 
asking  that  Hannibal  should  be  given  up  to  the  Romans. 
But  he  had  made  up  his  mind  to  escape,  and  sail  away  to 
another  land. 

He  was  afraid  that  the  people  in  the  ships  in  the  harbour 
of  Carthage  would  stop  him,  so  he  invited  all  the  captains 
to  a  great  feast,  and  begged  them  first  to  lend  him  the 
sails  of  their  ships  to  make  an  enormous  tent  in  which 
the  feast  should  be  held.  This  they  did,  and  when  they 
were  all  rejoicing  and  making  merry,  he  slipped  away  to  his 
ship,  and  even  when  it  was  known  that  he  had  gone,  it  was 
many  hours  before  the  ships  could  be  got  ready  to  follow  him. 


122  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

He  fought  for  some  years  on  the  side  of  first  one  enemy  of 
Rome  and  then  another,  but  these  were  the  days  when  the 
Romans  were  winning  in  all  their  battles,  and  at  last  Prussia's 
King  of  Bithynia,  whom  he  was  helping,  agreed  to  give  him 
up  to  the  Romans.  But  Hannibal  preferred  to  kill  himself 
rather  than  be  given  into  the  hands  of  his  life-long  enemy. 
When  he  knew  that  all  the  doors  of  his  house  were  guarded 
by  soldiers  ready  to  take  him  if  he  should  come  out,  he  drank 
poison,  and  so  died.  His  life-story  is  very  wonderful  and 
strange,  but  it  was  a  pity  that  so  clever  a  statesman  and  so 
brave  a  soldier  should  have  given  his  whole  life  to  a  hopeless 
revenge. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

ROME  AND  THE  EAST 

The  battle  of  Zama  and  the  peace  with  Carthage  in  the  year 
202  B.C.  made  it  quite  clear  that  no  other  power  could 
become  as  great  as  Rome  in  the  West  of  Europe.  She 
now  had  for  her  own  practically  all  Italy,  Sicily,  Corsica, 
Sardinia,  the  Carthaginian  lands  in  Spain  which  stretched 
over  a  great  space  in  the  North  and  another  in  the  South. 
Carthage  and  the  North  of  Africa  were  allied  with  her  and 
must  fight  against  any  enemy  of  the  Roman  people  if  asked 
to  do  so. 

It  was  almost  certain  that  Rome  would,  when  she  found 
herself  so  strong,  try  to  conquer  more  land  in  Western  Europe. 
But  immediately  after  the  peace  with  Hannibal  she  naturally 
turned  her  attention  to  the  East  of  Europe,  where  the  states 
were  fighting  among  themselves,  and  no  one  state  was  strong 
enough  to  conquer  the  others. 

We  saw  how  after  the  death  of  Alexander  the  Great 
his  empire  was  divided  into  many  kingdoms,  some  of 
which  were  governed  by  Greek  rulers  and  others  not. 
More  than  a  hundred  years  had  passed  since  the  death  of 
Alexander  when  the  people  of  Rome  turned  their  attention 
to  the  East.  The  Macedonian  kings  since  Alexander  had 
always  kept  their  rule  over  the  greater  part  of  Greece, 
though  some  of  the  towns  on  the  coast  had  set  themselves 
free ;  but  in  the  days  of  Philip  v..  King  of  Macedon,  some  of 
the  Greek  cities  joined  together  in  leagues  to  try  to  free 
Greece  from  Macedonian  rule.  As  this  Philip  v.  sent  help  to 
Hannibal  in  his  fight  with  Rome,  the  Romans  sent  help  to  a 

123 


124 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


PHILIP    V.    OF    MACEDON 


(From  a  Macedonian  coin). 


league  which  was  struggling  against  Philip,  and  when  peace 
was  made  with  Carthage  and  Rome  had  less  to  trouble  her  in 
the  West,  she  sent  an  army  to  fight  against  Philip  in  earnest. 
He  was  defeated  in  the  great  battle  of  Cynoscephalas,  and  so 
ended  the  Macedonian  rule  over  Greece. 

The  Romans  were  always  very  full  of  admiration  for  the 

greatness  and  beauty  of  Greece.    They 

were   so   practical   themselves    and    had 

so  little  of  the  natural  gift  for  art  and 

beauty  that  they  were  filled  with  a  kind 

of  wonder  at  the  beautiful  things  which 

had  been  done  and  written  by  the  Greeks 

in   the   past.      It   was   partly    this,    and 

partly    perhaps    for    other    reasons,   that 

Rome    having    freed    Greece   from    the 

Macedonians    declared   that   she    would 

leave   her  frise   to   govern  herself.     This 

proclamation   was   cried   aloud   at   the    Isthmian    games    at 

Corinth,  when  as  usual  a  great  crowd  of  people  from  all  parts 

of  Greece  had  met  together  for  the  festival. 

The  people  were  full  of  joy  at  the  good  news,  and  it 
was  said  afterwards  that  they  broke  out  into  a  great  cry  of 
gladness  which  could  be  heard  on  the  seashore  miles  away. 
The  Greeks  to  show  their  gratitude  set  free  many  Roman 
prisoners  who  had  been  taken  by  Hannibal  and  sold  to  them 
as  slaves.  But  the  old  weakness  of  the  Greeks  was  to  bring 
them  after  all  before  long  under  the  rule  of  Rome.  The 
states  were  still  always  quarrelling  among  themselves,  and  it 
was  natural  that  Rome  should  interfere,  and  in  the  end  make 
up  her  mind  to  rule  Greece  herself. 

Meanwhile  she  had  to  deal  with  other  people  in  the  East. 
Antiochus,  King  of  Syria,  was  anxious  to  gain  power  in  Egypt 
and  the  Egyptians  had  asked  for  help  from  Rome.  Antiochus 
was  a  friend,  too,  of  Philip  v.  of  Macedon,  but  had  not  been 
able  to  help  him  against  Rome.  As  soon  as  the  Romans  had 
left  Greece  one  of  the  leagues  asked  Antiochus  to  help  them 


ROME  AND  THE  EAST  125 

to  fight  against  Rome.  Antiochus  was  anxious  to  win  some 
of  the  lands  which  Philip  of  Macedon  had  lost,  but  he  was 
defeated  first  in  Greece  and  then  in  Asia  Minor.  He  had  to 
give  up  most  of  his  lands  and  pay  a  large  sum  of  money  to  the 
Romans. 

After  this  the  whole  of  Asia  Minor  belonged  to  Rome. 
Philip  V.  of  Macedon  was  still  full  of  anger  against  the 
Romans  and  was  always  planning  and  plotting  to  win 
Greece  again  for  Macedonia.  But  he  could  do  nothing. 
When  he  died,  his  son  Perseus  became  king,  and  he  was  even 
more  anxious  than  his  father  to  take  his  revenge  on  Rome. 
At  last  the  Romans  sent  an  army  to  fight  against  him  and  he 
was  completely  defeated.  Perseus  was  taken 
prisoner  to  Italy,  where  he  died  some  years 
later,  and  Macedonia  now  also  belonged  to 
Rome. 

It  was  the  custom  for  the  Roman  generals 
who  won  great  battles  to  have  a  triumphal 
procession  through  the  streets  of  Rome  on 
their    return.      The    triumph    of   ^milius      perseus,  son  of 
Paulus,    the    general    who     had     defeated  phiup  v. 

Perseus,  was  most  magnificent.  It  lasted  (From  a  coin). 
three  days,  and  the  Romans,  dressed  in 
the  white  robes  which  they  always  wore  on  days  of  festival, 
crowded  to  see  it.  On  the  first  day  two  hundred  and  fifty 
waggons  went  in  procession,  filled  up  with  beautiful  Greek 
statues  and  pictures  which  the  conquerors  had  brought 
from  Macedonia. 

On  the  second  day  waggons  carried  great  piles  of  beautiful 
polished  armour  and  swords  and  other  weapons,  taken  from 
the  bodies  of  the  Macedonian  soldiers  who  had  been  killed, 
and  great  piles  too  of  silver  cups  and  bowls,  also  taken  from 
the  conquered.  On  the  third  day  the  triumph  was  most 
magnificent,  but  even  the  Roman  people  felt  how  sad  it 
was,  for  behind  a  number  of  young  Roman  men  leading 
great  oxen,  decorated  with  flowers  and  ribbons,  to  be  killed 


126  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

in  sacrifice,  there  followed  all  the  gold  cups  and  plates  taken 
from  Perseus  himself. 

Behind  this  was  his  chariot  carrying  the  armour  and  the 
crown  which  he  would  never  wear  again.  Then  came  the 
three  children  of  Perseus  surrounded  by  their  teachers  and 
servants,  who  held  out  their  hands  to  the  crowd  as  though 
asking  for  pity.  Paulus  in  his  splendid  chariot  came  last,  but 
in  front  of  him  walked  Perseus  clothed  in  black,  looking  down 
at  the  ground  and  seeming  so  heartbroken  that  all  the  people 
were  sorry  for  him. 

The  End  of  Greek  Freedom 

Perseus  was  the  last  civilized  king  against  whom  Rome 
fought.  After  this  her  Empire  grew  larger  and  larger,  but  after 
the  fall  of  Greece  it  was  against  barbarous,  or  at  least  only 
half-civilized,  people  that  she  had  to  fight.  For  years  before  the 
conquest  of  Macedonia  the  Greek  states  had  been  quarrelling 
among  themselves  and  complaining  about  each  other  to  Rome, 
who  often  interfered  to  put  things  right.  But  after  the  conquest 
of  Macedonia  the  Romans  became  harder  towards  Greece. 
Some  Greeks  had  been  glad  when  Perseus  fought  against 
Rome,  and  one  thousand  of  the  noblest  of  these  people  were 
carried  off  to  Rome  and  kept  prisoners  there  for  seventeen 
years.  At  last,  when  one  of  the  leagues  tried  to  force  Sparta 
to  join  them  in  spite  of  Rome  forbidding  them  to  do  so,  war 
broke  out.  The  Romans  of  course  won,  and  Corinth,  a  city 
which  had  been  especially  bold  in  the  rebellion,  was  by  order 
of  the  Romans  burnt  to  the  ground,  and  at  last  Greece 
was  made  into  a  Roman  province  and  governed  by  a  Roman 
governor. 

It  was  in  the  year  146  b.c.  that  Corinth  was  burnt  and  the 
freedom  of  Greece  lost  for  ever.  The  beautiful  statues  and 
works  of  art  of  which  Corinth  was  full  were  sent  off  to  Rome. 
It  is  said  that  the  Roman  commander  who  sent  them  off  told 
the  owners  of  the  ships  that  if  any  were  broken  they  would 


ROME  AND  THE  EAST  127 

have  to  be  replaced  by  others  of  the  same  value.  He  was  a 
rough  soldier  and  did  not  understand  that  these  things  could 
never  be  replaced,  for  only  the  great  Greek  artists  of  a  time 
gone  by  could  make  them.  But  the  more  educated  Romans 
did  understand  this,  and  from  this  time  onwards  they  were 
constantly  learning  about  and  imitating  the  art  and  literature 
of  Greece,  and  it  is  through  the  Romans  that  we  to-day  have 
learnt  so  much  from  the  old  Greek  civilization. 

In  the  same  year  in  which  Corinth  was  burnt  the  Romans 
destroyed  Carthage  too.  They  had  long  wished  to  do  so. 
There  was  one  man  in  the  Senate  named  Cato  who  ended 
every  speech  he  made  for  several  years  with  the  words : 
*  Delenda  est  Carthago ' — '  Carthage  must  be  destroyed.'  It 
will  be  remembered  how  by  the  peace  made  with  Hannibal 
it  was  decided  that  Carthage  might  never  again  fight  an 
enemy  without  permission  from  the  Romans. 

The  king  of  Numidia,  a  country  close  to  Carthage,  was 
very  friendly  with  the  Romans,  but  always  annoying  Carthage. 
Rome  would  never  give  the  Carthaginians  permission  to  fight 
against  him,  but  at  last  they  could  stand  it  no  longer  and  did 
so.  Immediately  the  Romans  made  up  their  minds  to  punish 
them.  The  Carthaginians  were  told  that  they  must  destroy 
their  own  city,  but  they  said  they  would  not.  They  shut 
their  gates  against  the  Roman  army  which  was  sent  against 
them. 

For  three  years  they  stood  a  terrible  siege.  There  was  an 
immense  wall  all  round  the  city,  and  inside  the  women  joined 
with  the  men  making  javelins  and  other  weapons  to  fling  at 
the  Romans.  When  the  horse  hair  which  was  required  for 
certain  weapons  ran  short,  the  women  cut  off"  their  own  long 
hair  to  take  its  place.  The  Carthaginians  fought  like  lions. 
Sometimes  a  band  of  soldiers  would  come  out  to  the  walls 
and  scatter  the  Romans,  but  in  the  end  the  Romans  were 
able  to  prevent  any  food  going  into  the  city,  and  later  broke 
in.  There  was  fighting  for  three  days  in  the  narrow  streets. 
Houses  were  burnt  and  women  and  children  were  buried  in 


128  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

the  ruins.  The  town  was  completely  destroyed  and  the 
Romans  cursed  the  ruins. 

So  ended  the  Third  Punic  War — the  last  traces  of  a 
great  empire  and  of  a  people  who  with  all  their  faults  had 
done  wonderful  things  on  sea  and  land  before  the  Romans 
were  ever  heard  of. 

Rome  had  now  power  over  practically  all  the  lands  round 
the  Mediterranean  Sea  except  Egypt.  She  soon  finished 
the  conquest  of  Spain  and  the  South  of  Gaul,  which  is  now 
called  France.  Most  of  these  lands  were  already  Roman 
provinces  governed  by  Roman  governors,  and  those  which 
were  not  immediately  made  into  provinces  very  soon  became 
so.  It  will  be  interesting  to  see  what  changes  all  these 
victories  had  made  in  the  Romans  themselves. 


CHAPTER    XIV 

LAST  DAYS  OF  THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC 

Great  changes  had  come  over  the  Roman  people  during  the 
time  they  had  been  conquering  the  lands  round  the  Mediter- 
ranean Sea.  In  the  old  days  the  Romans  had  lived  very 
simply,  and  every  member  of  a  family  did  exactly  what  the 
father  said.  The  Roman  women  had  been  very  serious  and 
very  noble.  Even  now  it  is  considered  a  great  compliment  to 
say  that  a  woman  is  like  an  old  Roman  matron.  But  when 
the  Romans  began  to  fight  farther  from  home  the  fathers  of 
families  were  often  away  for  a  long  time,  and  the  old  family 
life  disappeared. 

In  the  old  days,  too,  the  Roman  people  had  lived  very 
simply,  but  as  some  of  them  grew  richer  they  began  to  live 
very  differently.  Some  of  the  women  cared  for  nothing  but 
amusing  themselves,  and  dressed  themselves  in  fine  clothes 
and  wore  a  great  deal  of  jewellery.  Some  of  them  left  their 
children  to  be  looked  after  altogether  by  slaves.  The  boys  in 
rich  houses  were  given  lessons  by  slaves  brought  from  Greece. 
Often  these  were  not  very  good  men,  and  though  they  taught 
the  boys  to  read  and  write  and  to  understand  the  wonderful 
writings  of  the  Greeks,  they  did  not  teach  them  how  important 
it  is  to  be  good  and  truthful  and  unselfish  as  the  Roman 
fathers  had  taught  their  children  in  the  old  days.  Of  course 
there  were  some  exceptions,  and  we  shall  hear  about  two 
noble  Romans  who  had  a  splendid  mother  who  brought  them 
up  in  the  good  old  way. 

The  fact  that  some  people  grew  very  rich  while  others  be- 
came very  poor  was  another  great  change  from  the  days  when 


130 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


every  Roman  had  a  little  land  of  his  own  and  none  was  either 
very  rich  or  very  poor.  Now  the  rich  people  all  over  Italy 
bought  great  quantities  of  land,  and  the  poorer  Italians  gave  up 
their  lands  ;  some  went  into  the  towns  and  others  to  the  wars, 
and  many  soldiers  when  they  came  home  from  the  wars 
had  nothing  to  live  on.     The  rich  new  landowners  had  many 

foreign  slaves  who  could  take  care  of 
the  sheep  and  cattle  on  the  lands,  and 
who  were  often  treated  very  much  like 
animals  themselves.  They  were  often 
driven  to  their  work  with  a  master 
standing  over  them  all  day,  and  then 
locked  up  at  night,  great  numbers 
together,  for  fear  they  should  escape. 
Land  which  had  been  used  by  the 
farmers  in  the  old  days  to  grow  corn 
was  now  left  to  feed  the  sheep,  and 
the  corn  was  brought  in  from  other 
countries. 

So  Italy  soon  began  to  have  three 
classes  of  men — the  rich  landowners, 
the  poor  Italians,  and  a  number  of 
slaves,  many  of  whom  were  in  the 
greatest  misery.  Sometimes  the  slaves 
in  one  part  of  the  country  or  another 
would  rise  up  and  attack  their  masters, 
but  they  were  always  put  down,  and  it  was  a  long  time 
before  any  one  thought  of  doing  anything  for  them. 

Then,  too,  the  government  of  Rome  had  changed  by  degrees. 
It  was  now  the  Senate  which  really  settled  everything,  and  the 
people  no  longer  had  any  power.  The  people  were  supposed 
to  choose  the  consuls  and  other  rulers,  but  as  no  ruler  held 
power  except  for  a  short  number  of  years,  and  as  the  consuls 
were  nearly  always  away  fighting,  the  Senate  soon  got  all  real 
power.  The  Senators  belonged  to  just  a  few  families  among 
the  rich  people,  and  though  they  knew  all  about  fighting  they 


A    ROMAN    NEGRO    SLAVE 

(From  a  statue  in  black  and  white 
marbles  in  the  Louvre). 


LAST  DAYS  OF  THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC     131 

had  no  idea  how  to  make  things  better  for  the  poor  people 
and  slaves,  and  did  not  even  think  about  it. 

Then,  again,  in  all  the  lands  under  the  rule  of  the  Romans 
only  those  people  who  were  Roman  *  citizens  '  were  really  safe, 
and  could  get  protection  for  their  lives  and  their  property  from 
the  government.  Long  after  this  we  shall  see  how  St.  Paul, 
because  he  was  a  Roman  citizen,  got  the  right  to  be  taken  to 
Rome  to  be  judged  by  the  ruler  there.  There  were  many  of  the 
Italian  *  allies  '  who  thought  that  as  they  had  helped  Rome  in 
her  wars  they  should  have  the  same  rights  as  her  'citizens.' 
It  was  a  long  time  before  the  Senate  would  grant  this. 

Such  was  the  state  of  things  in  Rome  in  the  last  hundred  and 
thirty  years  B.C.  But  during  this  time  some  Romans  began 
to  see  that  there  must  be  a  great  change  in  Italy  and  in  the 
Roman  state.  One  great  man  after  another  appeared  to  try 
to  put  things  right.  It  is  the  time  in  which  the  greatest  men 
in  Roman  history  lived,  and  at  the  end  of  this  hundred  years 
the  greatest  of  them  all  did  at  last  put  things  right.  We 
shall  see  now  who  these  men  were,  and  what  they  did. 

Many  of  them  belonged  to  the  same  rich  families  as  the 
Senators,  but  were  different  from  them  in  understanding 
something  about  the  troubles  of  the  other  people. 

Two  Noble  Romans 

The  first  of  these  great  Romans  were  two  brothers — 
Tiberius  and  Gaius  Gracchus.  They  belonged  to  a  noble 
family  in  Rome,  but  their  father  died  when  they  were 
quite  young.  Their  mother  was  a  noble  Roman  matron 
of  the  old  sort.  She  was  beautiful,  and  many  nobles 
asked  her  to  marry  them,  and  so  did  at  least  one  king, 
but  she  always  said  '  No,'  for  she  wanted  to  give  herself  up 
altogether  to  taking  care  of  her  boys. 

When  other  Roman  matrons  would  show  her  their  beautiful 
ornaments  and  jewellery  she  would  smile,  and  show  them  her 
sons,  saying  that  they  were  hei^  jewels.    Tiberius  was  nine  years 


132  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

older  than  Gaius.  Their  mother  had  them  taught  by  Greeks 
in  the  new  Roman  way,  but  she  herself  taught  them  to  be  good 
and  kind  and  to  think  of  others  more  than  themselves.  They 
grew  up  splendid  men,  and  lived  and  died  for  their  country. 

Tiberius  became  a  soldier,  and  fought  in  Africa  and  Spain, 
while  Gaius  was  still  having  lessons  at  home.  But  he  was  not 
content  like  other  soldiers  to  fight  and  win  for  Rome.  He 
saw  the  misery  all  over  Italy,  and  he  saw,  too,  how  the  soldiers 
who  came  back  from  the  wars  had  no  land  on  which  to  grow 
things  as  in  the  old  days  of  Rome,  and  how  they  stayed  in  the 
town,  where  the  people  were  becoming  poorer  and  more 
ignorant  and  rougher  every  day. 

The  Consuls,  or  chief  rulers  of  Rome,  had  always  been 
Patricians,  and  had  not  always  thought  enough  of  the 
happiness  of  the  Plebeians,  as  the  people  who  were  not  nobles 
were  called.  At  one  time  the  Plebeians  had  threatened  to 
leave  Rome  and  set  up  a  new  city  for  themselves  ;  but  it  was 
then  agreed  that  they  should  have  magistrates  of  their  own, 
called  Tribunes  of  the  People,  to  see  that  no  wrong  should  be 
done  to  the  people  by  the  other  rulers.  Tiberius  Gracchus 
was  one  of  these  magistrates. 

Tiberius  became  a  Tribune  of  the  People.  He  tried 
to  get  a  law  passed  to  take  some  of  the  land  away 
from  the  rich  people  and  to  give  it  to  the  soldiers  back 
from  the  wars,  so  that  they  could  become  farmers  and  live 
happy  and  useful  lives  in  the  country.  The  rich  people  were 
very  angry,  and  they  got  the  other  tribune  (for  there  were 
always  two)  to  '  veto '  the  law,  that  is,  to  say  he  was  against 
it.  In  the  old  days  if  a  tribune  vetoed  a  law  in  this  way  that 
was  an  end  of  it,  but  Tiberius  saw  that  the  Roman  govern- 
ment had  become  very  bad  indeed. 

Instead  of  the  old  Roman  people,  farmers  and  soldiers, 
who  used  to  choose  the  tribunes,  here  was  now  a  crowd 
of  rough  people  spending  their  days  lying  about  the  streets 
of  the  city.  Tiberius  thought  that  tribunes  chosen  by 
such   people   did   not   matter  much.      He    knew    that    his 


LAST  DAYS  OF  THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC     133 

law  was  good,  and  he  tried  to  force  the  Senate  to  do 
what  he  wanted.  Those  lands  which  really  belonged  to 
the  state  were  indeed  taken  away  from  the  rich  men,  and 
men  were  appointed  to  arrange  how  they  should  be  given  out 
to  the  poorer  people. 

But  before  this  was  done  Tiberius  Gracchus  was  mur- 
dered in  the  streets  of  Rome  by  a  crowd  of  angry  and 
terrible  people,  who  had  been  told  by  his  enemies  that  he 
was  really  trying  to  make  himself  king.  The  name  of  king 
had  been  hated  by  the  Romans  ever  since  the  early  days, 
when  the  last  of  the  Tarquins  had  been  chased  from  the  city. 

A  few  years  afterwards  Gains  Gracchus  began  over  again 
the  work  his  brother  had  tried  to  do,  and  began  it  in  a  wiser 
and  better  way.  Gains  was  an  even  finer  man  than  his 
brother.  He  was  as  full  of  pity  for  the  people  and  as  eager  to 
make  them  happy,  but  he  had  learned  from  his  brother's 
mistakes  that  it  would  not  do  to  go  against  the  Roman 
government.  So  he  did  his  best  to  make  that  government 
better.  For  a  long  time,  although  the  land  had  been  taken 
from  the  rich  people  it  was  not  divided  among  the  others,  and 
many  of  the  rich  men  hoped  it  would  never  be  given  up.  But 
Gains  Gracchus  became  tribune,  and  at  once  began  to  try  to 
settle  about  the  giving  out  of  the  land. 

As  he  knew  the  Senate  was  against  him,  he  tried  to 
put  new  men  into  it,  but  the  old  Senators  would  not 
have  them.  He  also  wanted  to  give  the  Italians  in  all 
parts  of  Italy  the  rights  of  Roman  citizens.  This  would 
have  been  a  very  good  thing,  but  it  made  the  people 
of  Rome  very  angry,  and  Gracchus  tried  to  please  them 
and  make  them  agree  with  his  plans  by  doing  another  thing 
which  was  not  very  wise. 

We  have  seen  how  rough  and  ignorant  the  people  of 
Rome  had  become.  Gains,  thought  he  could  get  them  to 
agree  to  his  plans  by  giving  them  very  cheap  food,  and  so 
they  were  allowed  to  buy  corn  and  bread  from  the  state 
for  less  money  than  it  cost  the  state  to  buy  it.     When  the 


134 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


people  in  the  country  round  about  Rome  knew  this  they 
too  crowded  into  the  towns,  and  there  were  soon  more  rough 
and  idle  people  than  ever  there.  For  years  after  this  every 
Roman  ruler  had  to  try  to  please  the  people  by  giving  them 
cheap  bread.  In  the  end  they  did  not  pay  anything  at  all,  but 
demanded  as  their  right  '  panem  and  circenses,'  bread  and 

circuses,  for  in  the  end  the  rulers 
had  to  give  them  free  amuse- 
ments as  well  as  free  bread. 

The  people  of  Rome  liked 
Gains  Gracchus  for  his  own  sake 
too.  He  was  a  splendid  speaker, 
and  when  he  made  speeches  he 
would  walk  restlessly  up  and 
down  speaking  in  a  quick  eager 
way  which  the  people  liked. 
But  his  enemies  were  too  many 
for  him,  and  the  Senate  set  up 
another  tribune  who  promised 
the  people  even  better  things 
than  Gracchus  had  given  them. 
He  was  chased  like  Tiberius 
through  the  streets  of  Rome, 
and  when  he  saw  that  he  was 
to  be  killed,  he  told  a  faithful 
slave  to  kill  him.  The  slave  did  so,  and  then  killed  himself. 
His  body  was  found  beside  his  master's.  So  both  these  noble 
sons  of  a  noble  mother  died  in  the  attempt  to  make  their 
country  happier  and  better. 

The  Gracchi  were  only  the  first  of  a  great  num- 
ber of  men  who  were  to  give  their  lives  in  the  attempt. 
Although  the  Senate  had  overcome  the  two  Gracchi, 
they  themselves  were  never  again  so  much  respected  by 
the  people.  Their  government  became  worse  and  worse. 
In  the  conquered  countries  the  Roman  governors  often  ruled 
very  badly,  although  things  had  been  made  better  by  Gains 


FREE    DISTRIBUTION    OF    BREAD    IN 
ROME 

(Enlarged  from  a  design  on  a  coin.     The 
Emperor  is  enthroned  on  the  left  supervis- 
ing the  distribution,  while  the  patron  god- 
dess of  Rome  approves  by  her  presence). 


THE    ROMAX    FORU.M    AS    IT    WAS,    LOOKING    TOWARDS    THE    COLISEUM 
(After  a  reconstruction  by  Hulsen.) 


THE    ROMAN    FORUM    AS    IX    IS,    FROM    THE    SAME    POINT    OF    VIEW. 
(From  a  photograph  by  Anderson.) 


LAST  DAYS  OF  THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC     135 

Gracchus.  He  had  passed  a  law  by  which  governors  were  to 
be  tried  at  home  if  the  people  they  governed  accused  them  of 
having  taken  money  from  them  wrongfully,  but  though  this 
law  did  some  good  it  could  not  altogether  put  things  right. 
Sometimes  these  governors  even  took  money  from  the 
enemies  of  Rome. 

Another  very  bad  thing  for  Rome  was  that  the  soldiers 
had  become  very  different  from  the  soldiers  of  Rome's 
early  days,  and  were  now  very  hard  to  manage.  As  a  matter 
of  fact,  the  only  thing  which  could  save  Rome  and  bring  order 
into  her  vast  Empire  was  that  some  strong  man  who  could 
manage  both  the  soldiers  and  the  state  should  seize  power. 
Over  and  over  again  in  this  hundred  years  it  seemed  that 
this  man  had  come ;  but  there  was  always  something  weak 
or  wanting  in  the  character  of  each,  until  in  the  end  the  great 
Julius  Caesar,  one  of  the  greatest  men  of  all  time,  rose  to  do 
the  work.  It  is  true  that  he  was  killed  as  his  task  was 
finished,  but  Augustus  who  came  after  him  had  the  way  made 
ready  for  him. 

But  in  the  days  just  after  the  death  of  Gains  Gracchus 
there  were  two  men,  great  soldiers,  who  tried  to  put  things 
right.  These  were  Caius  Marius,  a  young  man  who  was 
born  and  brought  up  as  a  peasant,  but  who  rose  to  be  one  of 
Rome's  greatest  soldiers  and  statesmen,  and  Lucius  Cornelius 
Sulla,  a  man  of  noble  birth  and  very  rich. 

The  two  men  were  very  different.  Marius  was  rough  but 
honest.  He  had  very  little  education,  but  he  was  a  splendid 
soldier,  and  he  was  anxious  to  make  the  lives  of  the  people 
happier  and  better.  He  hated  the  rich  and  noble  men  who 
often  lived  very  bad  lives  and  cared  only  to  make  themselves 
richer,  while  the  people  of  Italy  and  in  all  the  provinces  of  the 
Roman  Empire  were  growing  more  and  more  unhappy. 

Sulla  was  an  example  of  the  things  Marius  hated  so  much. 
He  was  well  educated,  and  knew  a  great  deal  about  Greek  art 
and  literature ;  but  he  did  not  make  good  use  of  his  know- 
ledge.    He  gave  himself  over  to  pleasures  of  the  worst  sort. 


136 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


He  was  horrible  to  look  at.  Naturally  he  was  not  very- 
healthy,  as  he  lived  so  irregularly,  sitting  up  drinking  and 
feasting  through  the  night.  He  had  blue  eyes,  but  they  had  a 
curious  stare,  and  his  face  was  covered  with  ugly  spots.  A 
Greek  jester  spoke  of  Sulla  as  'a  mulberry  sprinkled  over 
with  meal.' 

Marius    fought    in   a   war   with   Jugurtha,   the   ruler  of 

Numidia  in  North 
Africa.  Jugurtha 
had  tried  to  make 
his  country,  which 
had  been  an  ally  of 
Rome  ever  since  the 
days  of  Hannibal, 
now  independent  of 
Rome.  The  first 
man  sent  to  fight 
him  had  been  bought 
off,  and  Jugurtha  is 
said  to  have  spoken 
contemptuously  of 
Rome  as  *  a  city  for 
sale,  ready  to  fall 
into  the  hands  of  the 
first  bidder.'  The 
way  in  which  a 
small  country  like 
Numidia  was  able  to 
had  become.  It  was 
and   forced 


A    ROMAN    COUNTRY    SCENE 


(From  a  painting  on  the  wall  of  a  house  at  Pompeii). 


defy   Rome  shows  how   bad   things 

Marius   who    in    the   end    conquered    Numidia 

Jugurtha  to  give  himself  up  to  the  Romans. 

Sulla  was  fighting  under  Marius  at  the  time,  and  he  and 
his  friends  said  that  it  was  he  who  had  captured  Jugurtha. 
Sulla  had  a  ring  made  with  a  picture  on  it  of  Jugurtha  giving 
himself  up  to  him.  However,  Marius  was  allowed  a  splendid 
triumph  on  his  return  to  Rome,  in  which  Jugurtha  walked  as 


LAST  DAYS  OF  THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC     137 

a  prisoner  before  he  was  dropped  down  into  the  terrible 
Mamertine  prison,  which  was  really  a  damp  pit  with  water 
at  the  bottom.  There  he  was  left  to  starve  to  death,  for  the 
Romans  had  no  mercy  for  an  enemy  like  this. 

The  Barbarians  against  Rome 

Meanwhile  new  dangers  from  new  peoples  were  threaten- 
ing Rome.  There  was  a  fresh  movement  among  the 
'  barbarian '  peoples  of  Central  Europe.  Here  some  Celts 
and  many  Teutons,  both  people  of  the  great  Aryan  race  to 
which  the  Greeks  and  Romans  belonged,  were  beginning 
to  move  West  and  South  in  search  of  new  lands  and  new 
homes.  At  one  time  it  seemed  that  they  might  conquer 
Rome  itself.  Many  Roman  armies  were  sent  across  the  Alps 
to  fight  them,  and  prevent  them  crossing  into  Italy.  There 
were  now  regular  passes  across  the  Alps  into  Italy,  and  the 
march  was  not  difficult,  as  in  the  days  of  Hannibal. 

The  Roman  armies  were  destroyed  time  after  time  by  the 
barbarians,  until  Maritis  led  an  army  into  Gaul,  and  won  a 
great  victory  over  the  barbarians  there.  When  he  got  back 
to  Rome  he  heard  that  another  great  barbarian  army  had 
crossed  into  the  North-East  of  Italy.  He  marched  against 
this  too,  and  won  another  great  victory.  He  saved  Italy  from 
the  barbarians,  and  after  this  it  was  the  Romans  who  went 
against  the  barbarians  and  won  lands  from  them,  so  adding 
new  provinces  to  the  Empire. 

For  five  years,  one  after  another,  Marius  was  elected 
consul,  although  he  was  away  from  Rome  fighting.  This 
was  a  new  thing,  and  it  showed  how  the  people  were 
beginning  to  feel  that  the  man  who  ruled  the  soldiers  was 
the  really  important  person  in  the  state. 

By  this  time,  of  course,  Marius  had  put  order  into  the 
army.  There  was  no  longer  any  question  of  the  soldiers 
disobeying  their  officers,  and  they  all  adored  Marius.  They 
were  no  longer  men  who  became  soldiers  for  a  short  time  and . 


138  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

then  went  back  to  their  homes,  as  in  the  early  days  of  Rome, 
but  they  stayed  with  the  army  for  many  years,  and  they 
would  do  anything  their  general  told  them,  obeying  him 
rather  than  the  state.  Marius  had  not  much  idea  of  how 
to  make  things  better  in  Italy  itself,  but  both  he  and  Sulla 
did  their  best  in  fighting  against  the  Italians,  who  suddenly 
demanded  those  rights  of  Roman  citizenship  which  they  had 
wanted  for  years. 

As  the  Romans  still  refused  to  give  these  to  them,  they 
said  they  would  have  nothing  more  to  do  with  Rome.  The 
Italians,  except  the  Romans,  were  to  form  a  separate  state 
with  a  new  capital  called  Italica.  They  also  made  up  their 
minds  to  destroy  Rome.  Marius  and  Sulla  easily  prevented 
this,  but  in  the  end  the  Italians  won  their  right  to  citizenship, 
though  only  those  could  vote  who  could  and  would  go  to 
Rome  to  do  so. 

In  a  few  years,  however,  the  citizenship  was  really  given  to 
all  Italian  freemen,  and  so  the  whole  of  Italy  became  the  real 
centre  of  the  Roman  Empire.  In  the  end  this  made  things 
much  better  for  Rome  and  Italy,  but  things  could  never 
be  really  right  until  the  strong  man  should  come  who  could 
settle  Rome's  troubles  once  for  all. 

Marius  and  Sulla  were  becoming  more  and  more  jealous  of 
each  other  every  day.  Marius  was  now  growing  old,  and 
when  Mithridates  the  Great,  king  of  Pontus  in  Asia  Minor, 
began  to  attack  the  Roman  allies  in  Asia  Minor,  it  was  Sulla 
who  was  appointed  to  lead  an  army  against  him.  Marius  was 
very  jealous,  and  tried  to  please  the  Italians  by  some  new 
laws,  and  so  get  them  to  give  him  the  leadership  of  the  war 
instead  of  Sulla.  But  Sulla  marched  with  an  army  against 
Rome,  and  Marius  had  to  run  away.  He  was  caught  and  put 
in  prison,  and  was  even  condemned  to  die,  but  the  slave  who 
was  to  kill  him  would  not  do  it,  and  the  judges  let  Marius  go. 
He  fled  to  Africa,  and  then  Sulla  went  off  with  his  army 
to  the  East.  But  as  soon  as  he  had  gone,  one  of  the  consuls 
named  Cinna  tried  to  get  together  a  number  of  men  to  vote 


LAST  DAYS  OF  THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC     139 

that  Marius  should  be  called  back  in  spite  of  the  Senate.  On 
the  day  of  voting  fighting  broke  out,  and  thousands  were 
killed  in  the  streets  of  Rome.  Then  Marius  came  back  with 
an  army,  joined  Cinna,  and  together  they  killed  without 
mercy  every  man,  sick  or  poor,  who  had  been  against  Marius. 
Then  the  two  named  themselves  consuls  without  any  election, 
but  Marius  died  in  a  few  days.  The  people  were  glad  in 
spite  of  all  that  Marius  had  done  for  them  in  his  early  days, 
for  they  were  full  of  horror  at  the  terrible  bloodshed  which  he 
and  Cinna  had  caused. 

Sulla  meanwhile  had  put  things  right  in  the  East,  and 
now  sent  word  that  he  was  coming  back,  and  would  take 
vengeance  on  the  people  who  had  murdered  his  friends. 
Cinna  meant  to  fight  against  him,  but  was  killed  by  his  own 
soldiers.  The  Samnians  and  other  Italians  joined  the  enemies 
of  Sulla,  for  it  was  the  popular  party  of  Marius  and  Cinna 
which  had  given  them  the  rights  of  Roman  citizens.  Sulla 
came  back  and  won  victories  everywhere.  The  Samnians 
marched  to  take  Rome,  but  he  defeated  them  also,  and  the 
eight  thousand  whom  he  captured  were  not  even  kept  as  slaves, 
but  were  killed  on  the  Campus  Martins. 

Days  of  Bloodshed 

Sulla  was  determined  to  get  rid  of  the  whole  popular  party. 
He  drew  up  long  lists  of  the  richest  and  most  important  men 
on  that  side,  and  had  them  hunted  out  and  killed.  These 
lists  were  put  up  in  the  Forum,  and  the  people  crowded  to 
read  them.  No  one  knew  what  name  might  next  appear. 
The  near  relations  of  Marius  were  first  on  the  list.  Sulla 
had  had  himself  made  Dictator,  the  first  for  over  a  hundred 
years.  He  added  new  men  to  the  Senate,  and  passed  laws 
giving  it  all  power  in  the  state.  The  tribunes  and  the  popular 
assemblies  which  had  done  so  much  for  the  Romans  in  the 
past  had  no  longer  any  real  power. 

With  all  power  in  his  own  hands  Sulla  showed  no  shame 


140  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

in  taking  his  revenge.  The  body  of  Marius  was  taken  from 
his  grave  and  thrown  into  the  river  Anio.  New  lists  were 
drawn  up  one  after  another,  and  often  they  had  in  them  the 
names  of  men  who  were  not  really  enemies  of  Sulla,  but 
whose  lands  or  money  he  wanted  for  himself.  It  was 
now  that  the  young  Julius  Cassar  showed  something  of  what 
he  was  to  be  later.  Marius  had  married  an  aunt  of  Julius 
Cgesar,  although  he  himself  was  but  a  peasant,  and  she 
belonged  to  one  of  the  oldest  noble  families  of  Rome.  Julius 
Csesar  in  his  turn  was  married  to  Cornelia,  the  daughter  of 
Cinna.  So  he  was  related  to  both  the  great  leaders  of  the 
popular  party. 

Sulla  ordered  him  to  leave  his  wife,  but  Julius  Cassar  loved 
Cornelia  dearly,  and  he  said  he  would  not,  although  he 
knew  that  Sulla  might  kill  him  as  he  had  killed  so  many 
other  people.  However,  this  did  not  happen,  for  his  friends 
protected  him.  Sulla  let  him  off,  though  he  said  that  Csesar 
would  one  day  ruin  the  nobles,  for  he  was  '  more  than  a 
Marius.' 

But  for  a  time  Csesar  kept  quiet,  and  Sulla  had  things 
all  his  own  way.  When  he  had  made  the  Senate  quite 
strong  he  gave  up  his  power,  and  went  to  live  in  his  country 
house  near  Rome.  He  called  the  people  of  Rome  together 
to  tell  them  that  he  was  going  to  give  up  his  power,  and  he 
had  great  quantities  of  food  given  out  to  the  poor,  so  that 
they  might  feast  in  his  honour.  There  was  so  much  food 
that  some  had  to  be  thrown  away.  He  then  sent  away  the 
soldiers  who  had  guarded  him  as  ruler,  and  walked  through 
the  streets  of  the  city,  although  he  knew  that  there  were  many 
people  who  hated  him,  and  he  might  be  killed  at  any  moment. 

The  people  were  too  surprised  to  attack  him,  and  he  went 
off  to  live  his  curious  life  in  his  own  way,  drinking  and  feasting 
night  after  night  for  weeks,  and  then  suddenly  giving  up  all 
his  time  to  hard  study  and  reading.  When  he  died  in  a  few 
years  his  body  was  given  a  splendid  funeral  by  the  Senate. 
He  had  ordered  that  his  body  should  be  burnt,  for  he  was 


LAST  DAYS  OF  THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC     141 

afraid  that  some  enemy  might  treat  it  later  as  he  had  treated 
the  body  of  Marius.  Some  of  the  Romans  preferred  to  be 
buried,  and  others  cremated  or  burned,  but  the  family  of  Sulla 
had  previously  always  been  buried. 

Sulla  is  one  of  Rome's  great  men,  but  there  is  very  little 
to  like  or  admire  in  him.  He  fought  for  the  Senate  and 
the  noble  families  to  which  he  belonged,  but  he  was  a  bad, 
selfish  and  proud  man,  and  though  he  brought  some  kind  of 
order  into  the  state,  he  did  it  with  a  terrible  cruelty  that  was 
quite  unnecessary. 

Sulla  had  only  been  able  to  settle  Roman  affairs  for  a  time. 
So  long  as  he  lived  no  one  dared  to  go  against  the  government 
of  the  Senate,  which  he  had  tried  to  make  strong,  but  when 
he  died  a  change  was  at  once  felt.  The  Senate  soon  found 
that  its  powers  were  taken  from  it  in  the  same  way  as  before 
by  the  strong  men  who  ruled  the  army. 


The  Great  Julius  C^sar 

One  of  these  was  Gneuis  Pompeius  Magnus,  or  as  he 
was  afterwards  called,  Pompeius  the  Great. 
Another  was  the  great  Julius  Caesar. 
Each  of  these  did  great  things  for  Rome, 
and  in  the  end  there  was  a  great  jealousy 
and  struggle  between  them  as  there  had 
been  between  Sulla  and  Marius. 

Both  men  were  fine  soldiers.  Julius 
Caesar  was  of  course  one  of  the  finest 
generals  who  have  ever  lived.  Both  were 
handsome  men.  Pompeius  was  six  years 
older  than  Csesar.  Both  were  born  about 
one  hundred  years  B.C.  From  the  first  pompeius  the  great 
Caesar  shows  himself  a  stronger  man  than  (From  a  coin). 

Pompeius.      For  w^hen    Sulla  told  them 
both  to  give   up  their  wives  Pompeius  did   so,  but   Cassar 
refused.     At  first  Pompeius  took  the  part  of  the  Senate,  but 


142  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

later  he   went   over  to   the   popular  party,  and    the  people 
almost  adored  him. 

Caesar  from  the  first  took  the  people's  part.  He  also  was 
much  loved,  and  in  time  the  people  forgot  Pompeius,  and 
thought  only  of  Cassar.  Caesar  was  a  tall  handsome  man 
with  dark  hair  and  black  eyes,  which  lit  up  his  pale,  rather 
thin,  face.  He  looked  above  all  things  very  noble  and 
distinguished.  His  family,  which  was  one  of  the  oldest  in 
Rome,  was  said  to  be  descended  from  the  goddess  Venus. 

Cffisar  always  thought  a  great  deal  about  dress,  and  he 
wore  his  girdle  round  his  tunic  in  a  loose  way  which  was  the 
fashion  among  the  noble  young  men  of  his  day.  When  he 
was  quite  a  young  man,  Caesar  took  part  in  the  pleasures  and 
feastings  for  which  the  Roman  nobles  were  being  so  much 
blamed  at  the  time.  But  he  was  never  really  frivolous.  He 
seems  to  have  done  these  things  more  in  a  spirit  of  mischief 
than  anything  else.  He  always  meant  to  do  great  things  and 
he  did  them. 

For  some  time  after  the  death  of  Sulla,  Cassar  was  content 
to  help  Pompeius  to  gain  power  in  the  state.  But  the  great 
statesmen  of  the  time  had  to  be  great  soldiers  too,  and  soon 
Pompeius  had  to  leave  Rome  to  fight  her  enemies  far  away. 

Rome  was  then  being  threatened  by  three  sets  of  enemies. 
The  Mediterranean  Sea  was  full  of  pirate  ships  which  often 
took  for  themselves  the  ships  carrying  corn  to  Italy.  Some- 
times, too,  they  would  attack  a  ship,  and  take  as  prisoners  any 
rich  men  they  found  on  it,  and  refuse  to  let  them  go  until 
their  friends  paid  large  sums  of  money  in  ransom. 

Cassar  was  once  taken  prisoner  in  this  way  by  the  pirates. 
He  spent  his  time  reading  to  them  some  speeches  which  he 
had  composed.  At  the  same  time  he  told  them  that  he  would 
kill  them  when  he  got  the  chance.  And  so  he  did.  When 
his  ransom  was  paid  and  he  was  free,  he  fitted  out  a  ship  and 
went  against  these  same  pirates,  captured  them,  and  killed 
them  every  one. 

Pompeius   determined    to    chase    the    pirates   from   the 


LAST  DAYS  OF  THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC     143 

sea,  so  he  got  ready  a  great  fleet  of  ships,  and  went  out 
to  fight  them.  He  divided  his  ships  into  thirteen  sets,  and 
sent  them  out  to  different  parts  of  the  Mediterranean.  After 
some  fierce  fighting  the  sea  was  quite  cleared  of  the  pirates, 
and  Pompeius  came  back  to  Rome  in  triumph. 

Pompeius  helped,  too,  in  putting  down  the  famous 
*  Gladiators'  Revolt.'  This  broke  out  a  few  years  after  the 
death  of  Sulla.  Pompeius  was  in  Spain,  and  it  was  Crassus, 
the  richest  man  in  Rome,  who  put  down  the  revolt,  but 
Pompeius  came  back  in  time  to  help  at  the  end.  The 
gladiators  in  Rome  had  been  at  first  prisoners  taken  in  war. 
They  had  been  made  to  fight  until  one  or  other  was  killed. 

At  first  these  '  shows  '  only  happened  at  funerals,  but  later 
on  they  became  the  greatest  amusement  of  the  Roman 
people.  The  strongest  prisoners  and  slaves  were  chosen, 
and  trained  in  '  schools '  to  be  used  merely  to  amuse  the 
people.  In  every  fight  one  or  other  of  the  gladiators  fight- 
ing must  be  killed,  and  the  stronger  the  men  and  the  more 
desperate  the  fight  the  better  pleased  the  people  were. 

No  wonder  the  gladiators  were  miserable,  and  now  at 
last  two  hundred  of  them  from  a  big  'school'  at  Capua 
tried  to  escape.  Eighty  did  get  away,  and  they  chose  for 
their  leader  a  big  barbarian  from  Thrace  called  Spartacus. 
He  was  a  brave  and  wise  man.  Other  slaves  joined  him, 
and  there  were  risings  all  over  Italy.  But  in  the  end 
Spartacus  was  killed,  and  six  thousand  of  his  followers  were 
crucified  along  the  Appian  Way,  the  great  street  leading 
out  of  Rome  into  the  plain  of  Campania.  The  rising  of 
the  gladiators  is  but  another  example  of  the  disorder  and 
unhappiness  in  Italy  at  this  time. 

But  in  the  Far  East  another  enemy  had  to  be  faced. 
Mithridates  of  Pontus  had  been  defeated  by  Sulla,  and  his 
soldiers  chased  out  of  Greece  and  the  other  parts  of  the 
Roman  Empire  which  he  had  attacked.  But  he  was  now 
giving  trouble  again,  and  was  being  helped  by  Tigranes, 
the   king  of  Armenia,  who  had  even  conquered  Syria  and 


144  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

Judaea.  It  was  not  for  some  years  that  the  Senate  sent 
out  an  army  against  them,  and  when  they  did  so,  though  it 
conquered  Mithridates,  who  fled  to  Tigranes  in  Armenia,  the 
soldiers  would  not  obey  their  commander.  Pompeius  now 
went  out  and  soon  conquered  both  kings.  Mithridates  died, 
and  his  kingdom  was  joined  to  Bithynia,  and  the  two  became 
a  Roman  province. 

Tigranes  was  driven  back  into  Armenia,  and  Syria  became 
another  Roman  province.  From  this  time  the  land  in  Asia 
as  far  as  the  Euphrates  belonged  to  Rome  either  directly  as 
provinces  or  as  kingdoms  governed  by  kings  dependent  on  the 
Romans. 

When  Pompeius  got  back  to  Rome  after  being  away 
four  years  he  was  granted  a  triumph.  Great  slabs  of  bronze 
were  carried  before  him  on  which  were  engraved  the  story  of 
the  great  things  he  had  done  in  the  East,  how  he  had 
conquered  kingdoms,  set  up  new  cities  and  captured  eight 
hundred  ships,  and  made  treaties  which  it  was  hoped  would 
give  peace  to  the  Roman  Empire  in  the  East  at  last.  In 
the  procession  walked  three  hundred  princes  of  the  East 
whom  Pompeius  had  brought  back  as  prisoners.  But  in 
spite  of  all  this  the  people  were  not  so  glad  to  see  Pompeius 
as  he  had  expected  them  to  be. 

Cassar  was  now  first  favourite  with  them.  Another 
trouble  to  Pompeius  was  that  the  Senate  refused  to  agree 
to  the  settlements  he  had  made  in  the  East.  This  was  foolish, 
for  Pompeius  had  done  things  very  well,  but  the  Senate  was 
growing  ever  weaker  and  more  foolish.  However,  Caesar 
agreed  to  help  Pompeius,  who  was  married  to  his  daughter 
Julia,  whom  Csesar  loved  very  dearly  for  her  own  sake  and 
that  of  her  mother  Cornelia.  The  two  great  men  agreed  to 
join  with  a  third,  a  very  rich  man  named  Crassus,  to  take  the 
government  into  their  own  hands. 

The  Senate  was  too  weak  to  prevent  this.  Caesar  got  the 
people  to  approve  Pompeius's  doings  in  the  East.  He  himself 
became  consul  for  one  year,  and  then  got  himself  made  governor 


LAST  DAYS  OF  THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC     145 

of  the  Roman  provinces  in  the  South  of  France,  or  Gaul  as 
the  country  was  then  called.  Caesar's  chief  reason  for  wanting 
this  was  his  wish  to  drive  off  the  barbarian  tribes,  which  were 
now  ever  threatening  to  swarm  over  into  the  Roman  Empire 
itself. 

A  tribe  from  the  country  which  is  now  called  Switzer- 
land was  pressing  towards  the  Roman  province  of  Trans- 
Alpine  Gaul  (the  part  of  France  on  the  other  side  of  the  Alps 
from  Italy,  which  belonged  to  Rome.  That  part  on  the  side 
of  the  Alps  nearer  to  Italy  was  called  Cis-Alpine  Gaul). 

Cassar  immediately  led  his  army  against  them  and  conquered 
them,  and  this  was  but  the  beginning  of  wars  which  lasted 
nine  years,  and  in  which  Caesar  conquered  all  the  land  which 
we  now  call  France  and  Belgium  and  part  of  Germany  across 
the  Rhine,  and  added  them  to  the  Roman  Empire. 

The  story  of  these  wonderful  wars  was  written  down  by 
Cassar  himself  very  simply,  and  without  any  sign  of  pride.  The 
books  he  wrote  are  called  the  '  Commentaries  on  the  Gallic 
War,'  and  the  story  is  so  simple  and  yet  in  such  good  and  pure 
Latin  that  it  is  one  of  the  first  writings  to  be  given  to  boys 
and  girls  to  read  when  they  are  beginning  to  study  the  Latin 
language. 

The  story  is  very  exciting  of  how  C^sar  fought  with  his 
legions,  and  especially  his  favourite  Tenth  Legion,  against 
great  hordes  of  *  barbarians,'  who  in  spite  of  their  bravery 
were  in  no  way  equal  to  the  splendidly  trained  Roman 
soldiers  with  their  splendid  arms  and  weapons.  If  any  one 
could  have  conquered  Caesar  it  was  the  heroic  leader  of  the 
Gauls  named  Vercengetorix.  But  in  the  end  he  was  captured 
and  taken  to  Rome  to  be  led  in  triumph,  and  then  killed. 

It  was  while  he  was  conquering  Gaul  that  Csesar  crossed 
over  to  Britain  in  the  year  55  B.C.  The  Britons  had  somehow 
heard  of  his  coming,  and  their  soldiers  with  their  blue  eyes 
and  fair  hair,  and  their  bodies  painted  all  over  with  blue,  were 
ready  to  meet  him.  The  sea  was  not  deep  enough  for  the 
ships  to  sail  right  to  the  shore,  so  the  Romans  had  to  wade  to 

K 


146 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


the  land.  We  are  told  that  they  did  not  like  this,  and  some 
of  them  held  back,  but  the  standard-bearer  of  the  Tenth 
Legion  dashed  into  the  water,  and  called  to  the  soldiers  to 
follow  him  unless  they  wanted  to  see  their  standard  taken  by 
the  Britons. 

This  would  have  been  a  great  disgrace.     So  the  Romans 

fought  their  way  to  the  shore,  but 
they  did  not  stay  long  in  Britain. 
Next  year  they  came  again,  and 
this  time  had  some  real  hard  fights 
with  the  Britons.  The  Romans 
won,  but  again  sailed  away,  taking 
only  a  few  British  prisoners  to 
show  the  people  at  Rome  that 
Britain  was  conquered.  But  this 
was  not  really  true,  for  it  was  a 
hundred  years  before  the  Romans 
came  again,  and  began  really  to 
conquer  Britain  as  a  province  of 
their  empire. 

It  has  often  been  asked  why 
Caesar  was  so  anxious  to  win  Gaul 
for  Rome.  There  must  have  been 
many  reasons.  He  was  anxious  to 
do  great  things  because  he  felt  that 
he  alone  could  do  them.  It  is 
said  that  when  he  was  quite  a 
young  man  he  was  one  day  reading 
the  story  of  Alexander  the  Great 
and  suddenly  burst  into  tears.  Some  one  asked  him  why  he 
was  weeping,  and  he  answered  that  it  was  because  Alexander 
had  conquered  many  nations  when  he  was  his  age  and  he  as 
yet  had  done  nothing  great.  Perhaps,  too,  Caesar  was  anxious 
to  show  the  Roman  people  that  he  could  do  even  greater 
things  than  Pompeius. 

Even  during  the  years  he  was  in  Gaul,  he  would  come 


JULIUS    CESAR 

(From  the  splendid  portrait  bust  in  the 
British  Museum. ) 


LAST  DAYS  OF  THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC     147 

down  to  the  South  to  consult  with  Pompeius  and  Crassus 
about  the  affairs  of  Rome  or  to  meet  Senators  who  came  to 
show  him  honour,  for  the  Senate  was  becoming  more  and  more 
afraid  of  the  great  soldier  and  statesman  of  the  time.  Crassus 
went  off  to  the  East,  hoping  to  do  great  things  there  and  so 
make  himself  seem  equal  to  Ceesar,  but  he  died,  and  then  there 
were  only  Pompeius  and  Ceesar  left  to  fight  for  power  in 
Rome.  Julia,  the  wife  of  Pompeius,  died  too,  and  so  he  felt 
less  bound  to  Ceesar  than  before,  and  he  was  dreadfully 
jealous  of  him. 

When  Csesar's  work  in  Gaul  was  done  the  time  had  come 
for  him  to  return  to  Rome,  and  he  offered  himself  as  consul 
for  the  next  year.  Some  of  the  Senators,  and  especially  Cato, 
a  descendant  of  the  Cato  who  had  hated  Hannibal  so 
much,  were  dreadfully  afraid  of  his  return.  They  were  afraid 
that  he  would  do  away  altogether  with  the  old  Roman 
government,  the  Senate,  and  consuls,  and  tribunes,  and  all  the 
things  which  had  become  useless,  since,  as  we  have  seen,  it 
was  the  great  generals  like  Pompeius  and  Caesar  who  really 
ruled  the  state. 

But  there  was  one  great  difference  between  Pompeius 
and  Caesar.  Pompeius  never  quite  made  up  his  mind  to 
do  away  with  the  Senate,  whereas  Caesar,  they  knew,  w^ould 
have  no  pity  for  it,  but  would  try  to  give  good  government  in 
his  own  way. 

These  men  did  all  they  could  to  prevent  Caesar  being 
consul,  but  when  he  saw  this  he  led  his  army  into  Italy,  say- 
ing as  he  crossed  the  little  river  Rubicon  which  divided  Gaul 
from  Italy,  *Alea  jacta  est,'  'the  die  is  cast,'  as  though  he 
was  playing  a  game  of  dice  and  had  taken  the  throw,  and 
so  knew  he  could  never  turn  back.  Both  this  expression 
and  to  '  cross  the  Rubicon'  have  become  proverbs. 

When  the  Senate  and  his  enemies  heard  that  Caesar  was 
marching  upon  Rome  they  fled  in  terror,  and  when  Caesar 
arrived  there  was  no  form  of  government  left.  The  people, 
however,  made  him  Dictator.     He  knew  that  Pompeius,  who 


148  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

had  fled  to  the  East,  could  get  together  a  great  army  there, 
and  that  he  already  had  one  in  Spain. 

So  Cassar  did  not  stay  long  in  Rome,  but  went  oiF  to 
Spain  to  conquer  the  army  of  Pompeius  there.  He  con- 
quered them  and  then  let  them  go  free,  for  Csesar  was  not 
cruel  when  fighting  against  his  countrymen,  though  he  had 
not  shown  much  mercy  to  the  Gauls.  Then  he  hastened 
after  Pompeius  to  the  East,  where  he  defeated  him. 

Pompeius,  now  feeling  very  tired  and  old,  fled  to  Egypt, 
but  as  he  stepped  on  shore  his  head  was  cut  off"  by  one  of  the 
generals  of  the  king  of  Egypt.  His  body  was  thrown  into 
the  sea,  but  afterwards  taken  out  and  buried  by  a  faithful 
slave. 

CsessLV  followed  Pompeius  to  Egypt,  and  the  head  of  his 
enemy,  once  his  friend,  was  shown  to  him  in  triumph.  But 
Csesar  was  shocked  and  surprised  and  burst  into  tears  at  the 
sight.  Csesar  stayed  some  months  in  Egypt,  and  it  is  said  that 
this  was  because  he  had  fallen  in  love  with  Cleopatra,  the  sister 
of  the  young  Ptolemy,  as  the  ruler  of  Egypt  was  called. 

But  he  had  work  to  do  elsewhere,  for  in  different  parts 
of  the  Empire  the  friends  of  Pompeius  vv^ere  still  ready 
to  fight.  But  Csesar  conquered  them  all,  and  then  went 
back  to  Rome  as  Dictator  once  more.  He  had  already  in  the 
short  time  he  had  stayed  in  Rome  tried  to  settle  the  affairs  of 
the  country  and  the  Empire,  and  he  now  turned  his  attention 
altogether  to  this  work.  He  had  not  many  months  to  do  it  in. 
He  did  not  try  to  make  a  new  way  of  government,  but  he  kept 
all  power  in  his  own  hands. 

In  Rome  he  said  that  only  a  certain  number  of  people, 
and  these  the  very  poor,  should  receive  free  bread.  He  made 
the  number  of  slaves  in  Italy  much  smaller.  He  raised  the 
number  of  Senators  to  nine  hundred,  and  the  Senate  now 
had  in  it  men  from  the  middle  as  well  as  the  higher  class. 
But  it  could  never  again  have  any  real  power.  Above  all, 
Cfesar  himself  appointed  the  governors  of  the  provinces  of 
the  Empire,  and  they  had  to  account  to  him  for  their  govern- 


LAST  DAYS  OF  THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC     149 


ment.  From  the  time  of  Cassar  until  the  great  Roman 
Empire  broke  up  the  government  remained  in  one  man's 
hands  and  this  man  was  the  Emperor. 

Cffisar  himself  was  sometimes,  but  not  always,  called  by 
the  name  of  '  Imperator,'  but  after  his  day  it  became  the 
regular  name  of  the  ruler.  Several  times  attempts  were  made 
to  crown  him  '  King,'  but  Ceesar  knew  that 
the  name  had  been  hated  for  centuries  by 
the  Romans,  and  he  was  afraid  that  they 
would  turn  against  him,  although  they 
treated  him  almost  as  a  god.  He  was 
careful  to  please  the  people,  and  had  great 
festivals  prepared  for  them  at  which  gladi- 
ators would  fight  against  each  other  in  the 
theatre. 

Caesar  w^ould  be  present,  but  only  to 
please  the  people,  for  often  he  was  quietly 
writing  his  letters  and  not  looking  at  the 
performance  at  all.  Once,  when  he  was 
sitting  at  the  games  in  his  chair  of  gold, 
dressed  in  purple  and  with  a  golden 
wreath  of  bay  leaves  on  his  head, 
Antony,  one  of  his  friends,  suddenly 
came  up  to  him  and  placed  a  crown 
on  his  head.  As  he  did  so  he  said, 
'The  people  give  you  this.'  But  Ceesar 
took  the  crown  from  his  head  and  said 
in  a  loud  voice  so  that  every  one  could  hear,  '  I  am  not  king ; 
the  king  of  the  Romans  is  Jupiter,'  and  he  sent  the  crown 
as  an  offering  to  the  temple  of  Jupiter. 

All  the  same  there  were  many  people  who  said  that 
Caesar  was  a  tyrant.  They  wanted  what  they  called  '  liberty,' 
forgetting  all  the  terrible  things  which  had  happened  when 
the  government  of  Rome  had  grown  old  and  all  the  good 
things  Csesar  had  done  for  the  state.  So  it  was  that  even  the 
friends  to  whom  Ceesar  had  been  most  loving  and  kind  had 


A    ROMAN    LEGIONARY    SOLDIER 

(From  a  carving  on  Trajan's 
Column). 


150  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

a  certain  feeling  of  enmity  against  him  and  joined  in  a  plot 
to  kill  him. 

The  Death  of  C^sar 

Among  the  great  men  of  that  time  was  Cicero,  the  great 
writer  whose  splendid  speeches  are  often  given  to  boys  and 
girls  to  read  when  they  have  learnt  enough  Latin  to  read 
Cgesar  easily.  Cicero  was  not  a  great  statesman,  and  never 
really  knew  which  side  to  take,  but  although  he  too  was  sorry 
that  the  days  of  *  liberty '  were  over,  he  could  not  help  seeing 
how  much  good  Csesar  had  done  for  Rome.  He  knew  how 
many  dangers  threatened  Cassar,  and  at  least  once  warned  him 
in  a  splendid  speech  in  the  Senate  to  take  care  of  his  life, 
which  was  so  valuable  for  the  state. 

Cgesar  was  naturally  without  fear.  He  had  no  patience 
to  be  always  on  his  guard  against  danger,  and  made  his 
wife  and  his  best  friends  anxious  because  in  the  end  he 
went  about  without  the  guard  of  soldiers  which  he  had  had 
at  first.  Of  course  he  could  not  guess  that  even  some  of  his 
friends  had  joined  with  his  enemies  in  a  plot  to  kill  him.  He 
was  warned  by  an  old  man  who  was  supposed  to  be  able  to 
tell  things  which  were  going  to  happen  to  '  beware  of  the  ides 
of  March,'  that  is  of  the  15th  March,  the  very  day  he  died. 

The  night  before,  his  wife  Calpurnia  could  not  sleep,  being  full 
of  strange  dreams  and  fears.  In  the  morning  she  begged  him 
not  to  go  to  the  Senate-house,  but  he  would  not  stay  at  home. 
As  he  stood  that  day  in  the  Senate  without  sword  or  weapon, 
a  number  of  men  pressed  round  him  as  though  they  were 
going  to  ask  him  some  favour,  when  suddenly  he  saw  that 
they  were  going  to  strike  him  with  their  swords.  There  was 
no  chance  for  him,  but  he  was  going  to  try  to  fight  when  he 
caught  sight  of  Decimus  Brutus,  a  man  who  had  fought 
against  him  for  Pompeius,  but  who  had  since  been  his  friend. 
Caesar  had  treated  him  like  a  son,  and  the  shock  of  seeing  him 
among  his  enemies  was  very  terrible.  He  said  three  words, 
'  Et  tu.  Brute  ! '  '  You  also,  Brutus  ! '  and  then  seeing  that  he 


LAST  DAYS  OF  THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC     151 

must  die  he  drew  his  toga  over  his  face  and  fell  at  the  feet  of 
the  statue  of  Pompeius  which  he  had  had  put  in  the  Senate- 
house. 

There  as  he  lay  they  stabbed  him  to  death,  and  then 
stole  away  while  the  news  went  through  Rome  that  the 
*  tyrant '  was  dead.  There  was  one  man,  Marcus  Antonius, 
who  did  justice  to  Caesar's  memory.  He  was  not  so  much  the 
friend  of  Ceesar  as  ambitious  for  himself,  and  he  hoped  that  by 
showing  the  people  how  cruel  and  mean  the  men  were  who 
had  killed  Caesar,  he  would  be  able  to  get  the  power  of  the 
state  into  his  own  hands. 

A  few  days  later  the  body  of  Csesar  was  carried  into 
the  Forum  to  be  publicly  burned,  and  there  Antonius,  who 
was  a  splendid  speaker,  made  the  people  weep  with  the 
story  of  Cffisar's  wrongs.  He  told  them,  too,  how  Caesar  had 
left  all  his  gardens  and  some  of  his  money  to  the  people. 
He  asked  them  not  to  be  angry  with  the  murderers,  but  he 
showed  them  Caesar's  blood-stained  clothes,  and  pointing 
to  the  holes  in  them  said  the  names  of  those  who  had 
struck  the  blows.  The  people  became  almost  mad  with  anger 
and  sorrow,  and  old  soldiers  threw  their  armour  and  women 
their  ornaments  and  jewels  into  the  funeral  fire. 

Marcus  Antonius  became  the  hero  of  the  moment.  He 
was  named  Dictator,  and  war  broke  out  between  his  party  and 
those  of  Caesar's  murderers.  But  there  was  another  man 
anxious  to  avenge  Caesar's  murder  who  was  to  show  himself 
greater  than  Antonius.  This  was  the  young  Octavius,  the 
nephew  of  Csesar.  Caesar  had  adopted  him  as  his  son  and  left 
him  most  of  his  money.  It  is  almost  certain  that  he  meant 
him  to  rule  the  Roman  Empire  after  him,  and  so  he  did. 
Octavius  became  Emperor  of  Rome  and  was  called  Augustus. 
From  his  time  there  was  never  again  a  chance  of  the  old 
Senatorial  government  coming  back.  Julius  Csesar  had  made 
the  Empire  and  Augustus  inherited  it. 


CHAPTER  XV 

EARLY  DAYS  OF  THE  ROMAN  EMPIRE 

The  way  in  which  the  young  Octavius  took  up  Cassar's 
position,  and  began  to  act  at  once  as  though  he  had  a  claim 
to  be  Emperor,  shows  how  strong  Csesar  had  already  made  his 
position. 

Octavius  was  a  very  handsome  young  man.  There  is 
still  a  bust  of  him  in  the  British  Museum  in  London,  which 
shows  that  he  had  the  features  of  Julius  Csesar,  but  with  a 
much  softer  and  younger  look.  He  showed  himself  a  great 
man  in  the  way  in  which  he  took  up  Caesar's  work.  Antonius 
did  his  best  to  keep  him  from  seeming  too  important  to  the 
people,  and  for  a  time  Octavius  had  to  divide  the  Empire  with 
him.  The  murderers  of  Caesar  and  their  party  were  hunted 
out,  and  hundreds  of  them  killed.  Octavius  was  far  less 
merciful  than  Caesar  to  his  countrymen. 

But  when  this  was  done  the  jealousy  between  Octavius 
and  Antonius  showed  itself  plainly.  Antonius,  thinking  all 
was  safe,  gave  himself  up  to  pleasure.  In  Egypt  he  met 
Cleopatra,  who  had  charmed  Csesar  some  years  before.  But 
Antonius  fell  so  much  in  love  with  her  that  he  could  not 
leave  her,  even  when  he  knew  Octavius  was  coming  to  fight 
him.  He  spent  his  days  with  Cleopatra,  who  sailed  in  the 
Eastern  Mediterranean  in  a  ship  coated  with  gold,  and 
with  purple  sails  and  oars  of  silver.  When  at  last  Antonius 
and  Cleopatra  did  prepare  a  fleet  to  fight  with  that  of 
Octavius  it  was  easily  conquered,  and  the  two  fled  back  to 
Alexandria,  Cleopatra's  home.  Octavius  followed  them,  and 
Antonius  in  despair  killed  himself. 


154 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


When  Cleopatra  heard  that  Octavius  meant  to  take  her  back 
to  Rome  to  lead  her  in  triumph  through  the  streets,  she  too 
tried  to  kill  herself.  But  Octavius  was  very  anxious  to  show 
her  in  his  triumph,  and  she  was  not  allowed  to  have  any 
weapon.  She  managed,  however,  to  get  a  basket  of  beautiful 
ripe  figs  sent  to  her.  This  seemed  quite  harmless,  and  she 
was  allowed  to  have  them.  But  underneath  them  was  an  asp, 
a  kind  of  small  snake.  Cleopatra  knew  that  if  it  bit  her  she 
would  surely  die,  and  when  the  time  came  she  put  it  on  her 
bare  arm  and  so  killed  herself.  Two  of  her  women  slaves, 
who  were  their  mistress's  favourites,  killed  themselves  too. 
Octavius  now  made  Egypt  a  Roman  province. 

The  First  Roman  Emperor 

When  he  got  back  to  Rome  there  was  no  longer  any  one 

to  take  his  empire  from  him. 
It  was  now  that  he  was  first 
called  Augustus,  and  under  him 
now  for  the  first  time  for  years 
there  was  peace  in  all  parts  of 
the  great  Empire.  Augustus 
loved  peace,  and  he  loved  learn- 
ing and  poetry  too.  He  gathered 
scholars  and  poets  round  him. 
The  greatest  of  all  was  the  poet 
Virgil,  who  wrote  the  great  poem 
called  the  ^neid,  one  of  the 
most  wonderful  poems  ever 
written.  The  people  who  lived 
in  the  days  of  Augustus,  and 
the  Emperor  himself,  were  full  of 
admiration  for  the  great  history 
of  Rome.  It  was  the  Emperor 
who  asked  the  poet  to  write  a 
long  poem  on  the  beginnings  of 
its  greatness.     The  JEneid  tells  the  story  of  the  adventures  of 


THE    EMPEROR    AUGUSTUS 


(From  a  cameo  in  the  British  Museum). 


EARLY  DAYS  OF  THE  ROMAN  EMPIRE     155 

JEnesiS,  who  the  Romans  believed  was  the  son  of  the  goddess 
Venus  and  Anchises  and  the  ancestor  of  JuUus  Caesar  and 
Augustus. 

Augustus,  Uke  Caesar,  was  head  of  the  state  and  head  of 
the  army.  The  great  Empire,  divided  into  provinces,  was  ruled 
by  governors  appointed  by  him,  and  every  Roman  citizen 
could  appeal  to  the  Emperor.  Julius  Csesar  had  given  the 
rights  of  Roman  citizens  to  some  of  the  people  of  Gaul,  and 
later  they  were  given  to  specially  favoured  cities  throughout 
the  Empire. 

The  great  roads  which  the  Romans  knew  so  well  how  to 
build  had  already  begun  to  stretch  out  across  the  Empire. 
The  Roman  legions  were  always  marching  along  these  roads. 
Colonies  of  Romans  were  sent  to  distant  provinces,  and 
messengers  were  constantly  going  to  and  from  Rome  and 
the  provinces  to  let  the  Emperor  know  what  was  happening 
in  all  parts  of  the  Empire. 

Roman  civilization  spread  through  the  Empire.  Where 
there  were  already  towns  the  life  there  became  Roman, 
and  in  a  country  like  Britain,  where  there  were  hardly  any 
towns,  the  Romans  built  new  ones.  All  the  towns  in  England 
which  have  names  ending  with  '  Chester '  were  built  by  the 
Romans.  Chester  is  the  later  way  of  writing  '  castra,'  the 
Roman  word  for  camp.  London  was  already  in  existence 
when  a  hundred  years  after  Coesar's  invasion  the  Romans 
came  really  to  conquer  Britain,  but  York  was  founded  by  the 
Romans. 

When  the  Emperor  Claudius  sent  soldiers  to  conquer 
Britain  a  hundred  years  after  Ceesar's  'invasions,'  the  Britons 
fought  fiercely,  and  it  was  many  years  before  the  whole 
of  Britain  was  conquered.  Every  one  knows  the  story  of 
Caractacus,  the  brave  British  chief  who  was  taken  prisoner 
to  Rome,  and  spoke  so  bravely  that  the  Emperor  set  him  free. 
Everybody  knows,  too,  the  story  of  Boadicea,  the  British 
warrior  queen,  who  fought  as  bravely  as  any  man  against  the 
Romans,  who  had  whipped  her  and  insulted  her  daughters, 


156 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


and  how,  when  she  knew  she  could  not  win,  she  poisoned 
herself  and  her  two  daughters,  and  so  escaped  from  the 
Romans  whom  she  hated. 

But  Britain  became  a  Roman  province,  and  was  covered 
over  with  the  strong  walls  and  the  towns  which  the  Romans 
knew  so  well  how  to  build.     In  most  of  these  towns  set  up 


A    PORTION    OF    THE    GREAT    WALL    BUILT    FROM    THE    TYNE    TO    SOLWAY    FIRTH 
BY    THE    EMPEROR    HADRIAN    IN    A.D.     121 

This  wonderful  wall  was  built  to  keep  out  the  savage  tribes  from  the  north.    It  was  70  miles 

long,  18  feet  high,  and  8  feet  thick.     In  front  of  it  a  great  ditch  was  dug  40  feet  wide,  and 

all  along  it  forts  were  built. 


by  the  Romans  they  built  great  baths  and  theatres  so  that 
they  might  live  and  amuse  themselves  as  their  countrymen 
did  in  Italy.  Even  though  the  world  was  growing  more 
civilized,  the  old  terrible  fights  between  gladiators,  or  the 
hunting  of  wild  beasts  to  death  in  the  circus,  were  the  chief 
amusements  of  the  Romans,  and  they  spread  them  all  over 
the  Empire. 

For  some  hundreds  of  years  nothing  changed  very  much 
in  the  Empire  except  that  sometimes  bad  emperors  came 
after  good  ones,  but  even  this  did  not  make  a  very  great 


EARLY  DAYS  OF  THE  EOMAN  EMPIRE     157 

difference  except  to  the  people  in  Rome,  for  there  were  now 
a  great  number  of  officers  and  servants  who  did  the  Emperor's 
work  for  him. 

It  was  while  Augustus  was  still  Emperor  that  Jesus  Christ 
was  born  in  the  kingdom  of  Judaea  ruled  by  King  Herod,  but 
dependent  on  Rome.  At  the  time  no  one  noticed  it  except 
a  few  poor  shepherds  and  the  wise  men  of  the  East.  King 
Herod,  who  had  been  warned  of  the  birth  of  a  king,  thought 
he  was  killed  with  the  other  babies  of  Judaea  when  he  ordered 
all  the  boys  under  two  years  old  to  be  killed. 

But  later  men  knew  that  this  was  the  greatest  thing 
that  has  ever  happened  in  the  world,  and  all  the  things 
which  have  happened  since  are  counted  from  that  date,  so 
that  the  letters  a.d.,  meaning  'Anno  Domini'  or  'the  Year 
of  Our  Lord,'  are  used  instead  of  B.C.,  which  stand  for  '  Before 
Christ,'  in  giving  dates  after  this  time. 

The  Coming  of  Christianity 

When  the  Christian  religion  began  to  be  preached 
by  the  Apostles,  and  those  whom  they  taught  about  Our 
Lord,  the  fact  that  all  parts  of  the  Roman  Empire  were  so 
united  made  it  possible  for  the  Faith  to  spread  more  quickly. 
It  was  along  the  great  roads  of  the  Empire  that  the  preachers 
travelled,  and  it  was  chiefly  in  the  towns  that  they  stayed  to 
convert  and  baptize  the  people. 

St.  Paul  travelled  on  these  roads  in  Asia  Minor  and 
Greece,  preaching  the  gospel  to  Jews  and  Gentiles  (as  the 
Jews  called  those  who  were  not  Jews)  too.  Every  one  knows 
how  Paul  had  first  been  against  the  Christians  and  then  had 
been  converted,  and  how  he  understood  much  better  than 
the  other  followers  of  Our  Lord  that  the  Gospel  was  to  be 
preached  to  all  nations  and  not  only  to  the  Jews. 

St.  Paul  spent  his  life,  as  he  tells  us  himself,  in  journey- 
ing from  place  to  place  telling  about  the  teaching  of 
Our  Lord.     In  Athens  and   Corinth,  which  were  still  sreat 


158  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

cities,  but  where  the  people  now  lived  bad  lives,  he  made 
converts  to  Christianity.  In  Ephesus  he  was  nearly  killed  by 
the  crowd  when  he  preached  against  their  idolatrous  worship 
of 'Diana  of  the  Ephesians.'  In  the  crowd  were  many  men 
who  lived  by  making  images  of  the  goddess,  and  they  were 
angry  for  fear  the  people  would  no  longer  want  these  images. 

At  Jerusalem  the  Jews  who  were  still  against  Our  Lord 
complained  that  Paul  brought  Greeks  into  the  synagogue. 
The  Roman  governor  w^as  told  that  he  disturbed  the  peace, 
but  Paul  being  a  citizen  of  Tarsus,  a  place  which  had  received 
the  rights  of  Roman  citizenship,  '  appealed  to  Csesar.'  (The 
emperors  who  were  still  of  Caesar  s  family  still  kept  this 
name.) 

The  emperor  who  was  ruler  after  Augustus  was  his 
stepson  Tiberius.  Then  came  Claudius,  and  now  Nero,  the 
last  emperor  of  this  family,  was  ruling.  St.  Paul  was  taken 
to  Rome,  and  though  a  prisoner  he  was  allowed  to  preach. 
He  was  given  a  house  in  Rome,  but  always  had  to  go  about 
chained  by  one  hand  to  the  soldier  who  had  charge  of  him. 

The  Cruel  Emperor  Nero 

St.  Paul  was  very  unfortunate  in  coming  to  Rome  during  the 
reign  of  Nero,  who  was  one  of  the  cruellest  and  most  terrible 
men  who  have  ever  lived.  When  he  was  a  young  boy  he  was 
bright  and  handsome,  and  a  great  favourite  with  the  Roman 
people.  He  became  Emperor  when  he  was  seventeen-  -years 
old,  and  in  the  next  year  he  poisoned  his  brother  Britannicus 
for  fear  he  might  try  to  make  himself  Emperor  in  his 
place. 

Later,  when  he  wanted  to  marry  a  woman  whom  his  mother 
Agrippina  did  not  like,  he  made  up  his  mind  to  kill  his  mother 
too.  He  presented  her  with  a  beautiful  ship  with  sails  of 
silk,  but  it  was  so  made  that  when  it  got  out  to  sea  it  would 
split  in  two.  When  his  mother  went  on  the  ship  Nero  kissed 
her  with  every  sign  of  love,  although  he  hoped  he  was  sending 


EARLY  DAYS  OF  THE  ROMAN  EMPIRE     159 


her  to  her  death.  She  was  nearly  drowned,  but  was  saved 
by  some  fishermen,  and  then  Nero  had  her  stabbed  to 
death. 

Nero  spent  his  time  in  luxury  and  most  terrible  wickedness. 
He  loved  to  hurt  people.  Suddenly,  in  the  midst  of  all  this, 
a  great  fire  broke  out  in  Rome,  and  almost  the  whole  city  was 
burned  to  the  ground.  People  said  that  Nero  had  set  the  city 
on  fire  for  his  own  amusement,  and  that  while  it  burned  he 
stood  on  one  of  the  hills  outside 
Rome  and  sang  verses  from 
Homer  on  the  burning  of  Troy. 
The  tale  may  be  true,  for  Nero 
seemed  quite  mad  at  times. 

But  afterwards  he  grew  fright- 
ened lest  the  people  should  turn 
against  him,  and  so  he  said  that 
it  was  the  Christians,  the  people 
with  the  strange  new  religion, 
who  had  done  this  thing.  And 
so  he  had  the  Christians  of  Rome 
hunted  out  from  their  quiet 
homes,  where  they  lived  good 
and  holy  lives,  spending  much 
of  their  time  in  prayer.  Nero 
thought  he  would  kill  the  Chris- 
tians, and  amuse  the  Roman 
people  at  the  same  time,  so  he 
had   them   tied  to  poles   in  the 

theatre,  wrapped  in  cloths  dipped  in  oil,  and  then  set  fire 
to  them,  so  that  they  burned  like  living  torches. 

It  was  a  dreadful  sight,  but  Nero  rode  round  the 
circus  enjoying  it,  until  at  last  even  the  Roman  people, 
used  as  they  were  to  terrible  sights  of  bloodshed,  begged 
that  it  might  stop.  Paul  was  not  among  the  Christians 
who  were  burned,  but  both  he  and  St.  Peter  were  killed  soon 
after.     St.  Paul,  because  he  was  a  Roman  citizen,  was  allowed 


NERO    CROWNED    AS    VICTOR    IN    THE 
GREEK    GAMES 

(From  a  bust  in  the  Louvre). 


160  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

the  honourable  death  of  being  beheaded,  while  St.  Peter  was 
crucified  like  his  Master. 

But  before  long  every  one  grew  tired  of  Nero.  He  was 
terribly  vain  and  thought  himself  a  great  artist  and  poet. 
He  became  terribly  ugly  through  eating  and  drinking  too 
much,  and  all  near  him  trembled  at  his  anger,  for  it 
might  at  any  moment  mean  death  for  them.  He  preferred 
to  stay  at  Naples  rather  than  Rome,  and  it  was  here  that 
he  heard  that  the  generals  of  the  army  had  risen  against 
him,  and  that  the  Senate  had  condemned  him  to  die.  The 
Senate  of  course  had  now  no  power,  but  it  suited  the  leaders 
of  the  rebellion  to  make  use  of  them.  There  was  nothing  for 
Nero  to  do  but  kill  himself.  For  a  long  time  he  held  the  dagger 
to  his  throat,  too  frightened  to  strike  the  blow,  but  a  faithful 
servant  who  saw  that  it  was  the  easiest  death  for  his  master, 
gave  his  hand  a  sudden  push,  and  so  Nero  died. 

In  the  next  year  four  emperors  succeeded  one  another, 
being  put  forward  by  the  different  parts  of  the  army. 
Vespasian,  the  last  of  the  four,  was  followed  by  his  son  Titus, 
who  is  famous  for  his  great  siege  of  Jerusalem,  which 
destroyed  that  great  city  and  put  an  end  to  the  life  of  the 
Jews  as  a  nation.  The  Jews  had  always  hated  the  Roman 
rule,  partly  because,  although  the  Romans  tried  not  to  interfere 
with  the  Jewish  religion,  yet  they  could  not  help  doing  so  to  a 
certain  extent.     But  it  was  a  mad  thing  for  the  Jews  to  rebel. 

Jerusalem  was  a  wonderfully  strong  city  with  wall  within 
wall,  but  Titus  was  determined  to  destroy  it,  and  after  a 
terrible  siege  the  town  and  the  temple  were  burnt  to  the 
ground.  A  million  Jews  were  killed  and  a  hundred  thousand 
sold  as  slaves.  After  this  the  Jews  were  scattered  all  over 
the  world,  and  have  never  since  had  a  country  of  their  own. 

It  was  in  the  time  of  Titus,  too,  that  the  great  cities  of 
Pompeii  and  Herculaneum,  two  of  the  richest  towns  of  Italy, 
were  destroyed,  but  in  another  way.  Pompeii  stood  at  the  foot 
of  Mount  Vesuvius,  and  was  like  a  smaller  Rome  with  baths 
and  theatres  and  many  shops.    The  Romans  used  to  go  there  to 


EARLY  DAYS  OF  THE  ROMAN  EMPIRE     161 


make  holiday.  Suddenly,  with  very  little  warning,  the  volcano 
became  active,  the  earth  shook,  and  then  the  burning  lava 
poured  out  from  the  mountain  and  buried  the  cities.  Some 
people  got  away,  but  many  were  buried  under  the  lava. 
Some  years  ago  men  began  to  dig  out  the  buried  cities,  and 
found  them  very  little  different   from  what   they  were   in 


SOLDIERS    OF   THE    FAMOUS    PR^TORIAN    GUARD    AT    ROME 

In  the  later  days  of  the  Roman  Empire  the  man  who  could  get  the  Praetorian  Guard  on  his 
side  was  always  able  to  make  himself  Emperor.     (From  a  bas-relief  in  the  Louvre). 

Roman  days.  Even  the  bodies  of  the  people  may  be  seen 
preserved  by  the  layer  of  lava  poured  over  them  and  lying  in 
the  positions  of  fright  in  which  they  died. 

After  the  death  of  Nero  the  Christians  had  been  left  alone 
for  a  time.  As  a  rule  the  Romans  did  not  interfere  with  the 
religion  of  the  peoples  they  conquered.  They  set  up  temples 
to  their  own  gods  in  the  provinces,  and  very  often  the 
people  worshipped  them  as  well  as  their  own.  But  the  idea 
spread  that  the  Christians  were  against  the  state,  and  then 
they  would  from  time  to  time  be  asked  to  show  honour  to  the 


162  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

gods  of  Rome  as  a  proof  that  they  were  not.  This  they  could 
not  do,  as  they  knew  it  was  wrong  to  pretend  to  believe  in 
these  gods. 

Some  emperors  left  the  Christians  alone,  and  they  went 
on  quietly  converting  others,  some  rich  and  some  poor, 
bringing  happiness  for  the  first  time  into  the  lives  of 
slaves,  who  now  found  a  religion  which  said  that  all  people 
were  equal  in  the  sight  of  God.  In  days  of  persecution 
the  Christians  had  to  worship  in  secret.  In  Rome  they 
made  those  underground  passages  which  are  now  called  the 
Catacombs,  and  which  we  can  still  visit  and  see  the  graves 
of  some  of  the  martyrs. 

For  here  the  Christians  of  Rome  buried  their  dead  and 
held  their  services,  especially  in  times  of  persecution. 
The  bodies  of  the  dead  were  placed  on  shelves  opening 
into  the  wall,  and  a  slab  of  stone  or  marble  was  then 
placed  in  front.  Sometimes  there  is  not  any  name  or  mark 
on  these  slabs,  but  often  there  is  painted  or  cut  the  name  of 
the  person  buried,  and  sometimes  there  are  drawings  or 
images  such  as  the  early  Christians  used.  Sometimes  there 
will  be  seen  a  palm,  which  may  mean  that  the  person  buried 
there  was  a  martyr.  Often  there  is  a  fish,  which  was  a  sign 
much  used  by  the  early  Christians. 

Often  little  vases  or  bottles,  which  have  in  them  a  red 
liquid  dried  up,  have  been  found.  People  used  to 
think  that  this  was  the  blood  of  the  martyrs,  but  it  is 
now  thought  that  it  was  the  red  wine  used  by  the  priest 
in  saying  mass  at  the  tombs.  The  story  of  these  martyrs 
makes  us  understand  better  than  anything  else  the  great 
change  which  the  Christian  religion  had  made  in  the  lives 
of  people  everywhere.  While  many  of  those  who  were  not 
Christians,  especially  the  rich  people,  still  lived  the  terrible 
lives  of  which  Nero's  gives  us  the  worst  example,  and  while 
many  of  the  poorer  people  who  were  not  Christians  led  bad 
lives  too,  the  Christians  showed  a  beautiful  example  of  love 
and  peace  and  courage. 


EARLY  DAYS  OF  THE  ROMAN  EMPIRE     163 

The  Early  Christian  Saints  and  Martyrs 

It  was  a  time  of  great  saints.  We  can  only  mention 
one  or  two  of  these  saints.  There  was  Saint  Ignatius, 
Bishop  of  Antioch  in  Syria.  Under  the  Emperor  Trajan, 
an  order  was  given  that  everybody  in  all  the  provinces 
should  make  a  sacrifice  to  the  gods  in  honour  of  his  hav- 
ing conquered  and  added  Dacia,  a  new  province  across  the 
Danube,  to  the  Empire.  When  the  Christians  of  Antioch 
refused  to  do  this,  Trajan  ordered  that  their  bishop  should  be 
brought  before  him.  He  hoped  to  persuade  him  to  worship 
the  gods,  but  Ignatius  refused  and  was  sent  to  Rome.  Here 
he  was  taken  into  the  Coliseum,  the  great  theatre  where  the 
Roman  games  were  held,  and  there  he  was  torn  to  pieces 
before  all  the  people  and  eaten  by  two  hungry  lions  who 
were  let  loose  upon  him. 

Yet  Trajan  was  not  a  bad  man.  Indeed,  he  was  the  first 
of  five  emperors  who  ruled  from  96  a.d.  to  180  a.d.,  and  were 
called  the  Good  Emperors.  One  of  these,  the  great  Marcus 
Aurelius,  was  so  good  and  wise  that  in  some  ways  he  was 
almost  a  saint.  He  wrote  a  book  of  '  Thoughts  '  which  is 
read  and  considered  very  wonderful  even  now.  But  he  did 
not  understand  the  Christians,  and  the  persecution  went  on 
under  him  also.  It  was  under  him  that  St.  Cecilia,  the  patron 
saint  of  music,  was  put  to  death.  She  was  a  noble  lady  of 
Rome  or  Sicily  who  had  become  a  Christian,  and  persuaded 
her  husband  to  do  so  too.  It  is  said  that  the  executioner  who 
was  to  behead  her,  seeing  her  so  good  and  beautiful,  trembled 
so  much  that  he  only  wounded  her,  and  she  lay  for  three  days 
before  she  died,  singing  all  the  time  her  praises  to  God.  It 
was  said  afterwards  that  St.  Cecilia  was  the  first  to  invent 
playing  on  the  organ,  and  in  pictures  she  is  generally  seen 
with  organ  pipes  in  her  hands. 

A  splendid  church  which  was  built  in  her  honour  may  be  seen 
in  Rome  to-day,  and  in  it  is  a  beautiful  statue  in  white  marble 
of  the  saint  as  she  lay  when  the  executioner  had  done  his  work. 


164 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


After  the  death  of  Marcus  Aurelius,  his  son,  a  very  bad 
man,  ruled  for  a  few  years,  and  was  then  murdered.  After 
this  came  another  long  time  during  which  one  emperor  after 
another  was  set  up  by  the  legions.  One  of  the  great  things 
which  the  early  emperors  had  done  was  to  strengthen  the 
frontiers  or  boundaries  of  the  Empire  to  keep  the  *  barbarians  ' 


.^■^^^ 


A    TRIUMPH    OF    ROMAN    ARCHITECTURE 


The  Pont  du  Gard,  perhaps  the  finest  aqueduct  the  Romans  ever  built.     It  carried  water 
across  the  river  Gardon  in  France.     (From  a  photograph). 

out.  Even  in  Britain  we  can  still  see  the  wall  which  Hadrian 
built  between  England  and  Scotland  to  keep  out  the  barbarous 
Picts  and  Scots. 

But  in  the  third  hundred  years  after  Our  Lord's  birth 
the  barbarians  were  becoming  too  strong  and  were  begin- 
ning to  burst  over  the  frontiers.  Emperor  after  emperor 
themselves  led  the  soldiers  against  them,  but  it  was  of  no 
use.  The  Emperor  Diocletian  chose  another  emperor  to 
help  him  to  govern,  and  two  under-emperors  who  were  called 
Caesars.     The  Empire  was  for  a  time  divided  between  these. 


EARLY  DAYS  OF  THE  ROMAN  EMPIRE     165 

It  was  under  Diocletian  that  the  last  and  most  terrible 
persecution  of  the  Christians  took  place.  While  the  bar- 
barians threatened  the  Empire  from  outside  it  was  felt  that 
the  Christians  were  a  danger  inside,  and  thousands  every- 
where, but  especially  in  Rome,  were  flung  to  the  lions. 
St.  Agnes,  the  patron  saint  of  young  girls,  died  in  this  persecu- 
tion. The  story  is  that  she  was  a  Roman  girl  thirteen  years 
old,  and  belonging  to  a  noble  family.  A  rich  Roman  who 
was  not  a  Christian  wanted  her  to  marry  his  son,  but  she 
would  not,  and  so  he  had  her  killed  as  a  Christian.  At  first 
they  tried  to  burn  her,  but  the  fi^re  would  not  burn.  So  they 
took  her  outside  the  city  and  cut  off  her  head. 

One  of  the  two  '  Cassars '  whom  Diocletian  had  chosen  to 
help  him  was  Constantine,  who  afterwards  became  head 
of  the  whole  Empire,  and  was  called  Constantine  the  Great. 
He  was  a  handsome  man  and  a  fine  soldier. 

Under  him  a  wonderful  thing  happened  for  the  Christians. 
Constantine  was  fighting  in  a  battle  against  a  man  who  wanted 
to  take  part  of  the  Empire  for  himself,  when  he  saw  a  great  cross 
of  fire  in  the  sky,  and  across  it  was  written  the  words  '  Under 
this  Standard  thou  shalt  Conquer.'  Constantine  won  the 
battle,  and  after  that  he  said  that  the  Christian  religion  should 
be  the  religion  of  the  Roman  people. 

So  the  great  fight  was  won.  Henceforward  the  Christians 
could  not  only  worship  freely,  but  people  were  encouraged 
to  join  them.  In  a  very  short  time  the  v/hole  Empire  was 
Christian.  When  the  barbarians  broke  in  and  swarmed  over 
the  Empire  this  is  what  they  found,  and  they  in  their  turn 
became  Christians  too.  It  seemed  as  though  the  way  was 
suddenly  made  clear  very  wonderfully  for  the  spread  of  the 
Christian  religion,  but  it  was  the  quiet  work  and  prayer  and 
the  noble  deaths  of  the  martyrs  which  had  prepared  the  way. 


CHAPTER   XVI 

THE  BARBARIANS  AND  THE  EMPIRE 

For  many  years  before  the  time  of  Constantine,  the  city  of 
Rome  was  becoming  less  and  less  important  in  the  Empire. 
The  emperors  often  preferred  to  live  somewhere  else,  and 
especially  when  Diocletian  broke  the  Empire  up  under  four 
rulers.  Constantine  liked  the  ways  of  the  Eastern  Empire 
better  than  the  West,  and  he  made  up  his  mind  to  make  for 
himself  a  new  capital  there.  He  chose  for  it  Byzantium,  an 
old  Greek  colony,  beautifully  situated  on  the  shores  of  the 
sea  of  Bosphorus,  and  the  bay  called  the  Golden  Horn. 
Byzantium  was  only  a  little  city,  but  Constantine  had  houses 
and  churches,  theatres  and  baths  built  round  about  it,  and 
made  it  into  a  'new  Rome.'  The  name  of  the  city  was 
changed  into  '  Constantinople,'  or  the  city  of  Constantine,  and 
so  it  is  called  to  this  day. 

Rome,  however,  became  important  in  another  way.  Its 
bishop  was  the  chief  bishop  of  the  Christian  church.  He 
came  to  be  called  the  Pope,  and  in  time  became  much  more 
powerful  than  any  emperor  or  king.  If  the  emperor  had 
stayed  in  Rome,  it  would  not  have  been  so  easy  for  the  Pope 
to  become  so  great,  and  this  is  one  important  result  of 
Constantine  choosing  a  new  capital  in  the  East. 

Another  important  result  was  that  it  made  it  easier  for 
the  *  barbarians,'  who,  as  we  have  seen,  were  ready  to  break 
into  the  Empire  to  do  so.  In  a  hundred  years  from 
Constantine's  time,  the  Roman  Empire  had  become  an 
Eastern  Empire  only,  and  swarms  of  barbarians  were 
settling  down  on  the  western  part,  ready  to  break  it  up 
into  new  nations,  each  under  a  different  king. 

166 


THE  BARBARIANS  AND  THE  EMPIRE     167 


Ever  since  the  days  of  Caesar  and  Augustus,  the  rulers  of 
Rome  had  known  that  there  was  a  great  movement  going  on 
among  the  barbarian  peoples.  From  time  to  time  the 
emperors  had  found  it  necessary  to  drive  some  tribes  back 
as  they  crossed  into  the  Empire  itself.  Always  they  had 
had  to  keep  a  good  watch  on  the 
frontiers,  and  in  the  end  they 
allowed  some  of  these  peoples  to 
settle  down  in  the  Roman  pro- 
vinces round  the  Danube,  which 
was  always  the  hardest  frontier  to 
keep  safe.  In  time,  too,  the 
emperors  began  to  take  men  from 
the  peoples  who  had  settled  down 
to  fight  in  the  Roman  army.  This 
was  a  mistake,  for  when  the  time 
came  for  these  soldiers  to  fight 
the  barbarians  they  did  not  care 
to  do  so. 

The  chief  among  these  bar- 
barian peoples  who  were  threaten- 
ing Rome  were  the  Goths,  the 
Vandals,  the  Burgundians,  and  the 
Franks.  They  were  all  of  the 
Teutonic  race,  to  which  the  Eng- 
lish who  conquered  Britain  also 
belonged.  They  were  big,  fair 
men,  seeming  almost  like  giants 
to    the    Italians,    and    the    other 

peoples  already  living  in  Spain,  and  France,  and  Africa,  and 
all  the  lands  of  the  western  part  of  the  Roman  Empire. 

Behind  the  Teutons  there  were  other  peoples  belonging 
to  the  Slavonic  race.  These  pushed  the  Teutons  before  them, 
but  in  the  end  settled  down  in  the  East  of  Europe.  The 
people  of  the  countries  which  are  now  called  Hungary, 
Servia,    and    Bulgaria   came    from    this   race.      They    were 


CONSTANTINE    THE    GREAT 


The  first  Christian  Emperor, 
statue  at  Rome). 


(From  a 


168  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

smaller,  darker,  and  more  like  the  peoples  of  the  East  than 
the  Teutons. 

Behind  them  again  pushed  a  terrible  people  called  the 
Huns.  They  were  small  savages,  and  came  from  the 
wildest  parts  of  Central  Asia.  They  were  fierce  and  good 
fighters,  but  they  could  not  keep  together  as  well  as  the 
Teutons,  or  make  use  of  a  victory  when  they  won  it.  In  the 
end  they  were  driven  right  out  of  Europe  again.  The  mov- 
ing about  of  all  these  peoples  is  now  called  the  '  Wandering 
of  the  Nations.' 

People  have  often  wondered  how  it  was  that  the  great 
Roman  Empire  came  to  be  overrun  by  the  barbarian  peoples. 
It  has  been  said  that  it  was  because  the  people  in  the  Roman 
Empire  were  weak  and  wicked,  while  the  new  peoples  were 
brave  and  honest.  But  we  must  remember  that  now  nearly 
all  the  people  in  the  Empire  had  become  Christians,  and 
most  of  them  lived  good  lives. 

One  reason,  perhaps,  was  that  the  Empire  was  too  big, 
and  it  was  impossible  for  any  but  very  clever  rulers  to  rule 
it  properly.  We  have  already  seen  how  it  was,  as  it  were, 
falling  to  pieces  when  it  had  to  be  divided  among  several 
rulers.  Then  again  there  were  great  numbers  of  the  bar- 
barians, and  generally  the  armies  which  fought  against  them 
were  much  smaller,  but  quite  as  brave. 

The  people  of  the  Empire,  too,  had  not  so  much  interest 
in  fighting  for  the  Empire  as  people  to-day  in  fighting 
for  their  own  countries.  But  the  barbarians  themselves  saw 
that  the  Empire  was  not  weak  and  bad,  and  were  glad  to 
learn  many  things  from  the  people  they  conquered.  One 
thing  which  they  learned  was  the  Christian  religion,  and 
all  these  peoples  who  settled  down  in  the  Empire  became 
Christians  in  the  end. 

No  sooner  had  Constant! ne  made  the  whole  Empire 
Christian,  than  the  Christians  began  to  quarrel  among 
themselves.  A  priest  of  Egypt  called  Arius  taught  that 
Our  Lord  was  not  quite  equal  to  God   the  Father,  and  a 


THE  BARBARIANS  AND  THE  EMPIRE     169 

great  many  people  believed  this.  His  followers  were  called 
*  Arians,'  and  many  of  the  barbarians  as  they  were  converted 
by  Arians  became  Arians  too.  Constantine  was  very  sorry 
to  see  the  Christians  quarrelling  among  themselves,  and  he 
called  a  great  council,  that  is,  a  meeting  of  bishops  from  all 
parts  of  the  Church,  to  discuss  the  question.  They  met  at  the 
town  of  Nicsea,  some  having  travelled  thousands  of  miles  to 
be  present. 

This  council  of  Niceea,  the  first  great  council  of  the 
Church,  said  that  Arius  was  wrong.  One  of  those  who 
spoke  most  against  Arius  at  the  council  was  a  young  priest 
called  Athanasius,  who  came  from  Alexandria.  After  the 
council  there  were  many  people  who  still  were  Arians,  and 
Athanasius  spent  his  long  life  in  preaching  and  writing 
against  them.  It  was  he  who  wrote  the  famous  '  Athanasian 
Creed,'  which  is  still  read  in  the  churches. 

Julian  the  Apostate 

Athanasius  w^as  a  saint,  but  he  was  only  one  of  many  who 
lived  in  the  hundred  years  after  the  time  when  Constantine 
made  the  Empire  Christian.  There  were  Basil  and  Gregory, 
who  were  companions  with  the  Emperor  Julian  when  they 
were  students  in  the  schools  of  Athens.  (For  Athens  was 
still  a  great  place  for  learning.)  Julian  was  a  nephew  of 
Constantine  the  Great,  and  afterwards  became  emperor  him- 
self. He  is  famous  because  he  tried  to  destroy  the  Christian 
religion  and  make  the  Empire  pagan  again. 

In  spite  of  being  a  great  friend  of  St.  Basil  and  St.  Gregory 
in  his  young  days,  Julian  had  never  really  believed  in  Christi- 
anity. When  he  was  emperor  he  did  all  he  could  to  hurt 
the  Christians,  though  he  did  not  persecute  them  like  the 
emperors  in  the  old  days  of  paganism.  He  built  again  the 
pagan  temples,  and  he  would  not  let  the  Christians  study  the 
old  writings  of  the  Greeks  and  Romans.  He  said  that  if  they 
did  not  believe  in  the  gods,  they  should  not  read  about  them. 


170  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

He  really  hoped  that  the  Christians  would  become  ignorant 
and  uneducated. 

But  Christianity  was  too  strong  for  him,  and  it  is  said  that 
on  his  deathbed  he  cried  in  anger  '  Galilean '  (meaning  Our 
Lord),  '  Thou  hast  conquered.'  Meanwhile  his  two  school 
companions  had  been  living  holy  lives.  Basil  had  become 
the  head  of  a  monastery  in  an  eastern  desert,  spending  his 
time  in  prayer,  and  work,  and  fasting  with  other  holy  men 
who  joined  him.  He  had  wanted  Gregory  to  go  too,  but 
he  had  become  a  priest,  and  then  bishop  of  Csesarea,  and 
afterwards  of  Constantinople. 

Another  great  saint  of  this  time,  and  one  of  the  four 
great  '  doctors '  of  the  Church,  was  St.  Ambrose,  archbishop 
of  Milan.  He,  too,  spent  his  life  fighting  the  Arians.  He 
was  a  very  noble  and  charitable  man.  Once  when  the  Goths 
carried  off  a  great  number  of  Christians  (for  all  this  time  the 
barbarians  were  attacking  the  Empire)  St.  Ambrose  sold  all 
he  could  find,  even  the  beautiful  gold  cups  belonging  to  his 
church,  to  buy  them  back. 

He  showed  how  brave  he  was  when  once  he  refused  to 
allow  Theodosius  the  Emperor  to  go  into  his  church.  At 
least  so  the  story  goes.  In  any  case,  St.  Ambrose  wrote  a 
letter  reproving  the  emperor,  and  Theodosius  in  his  turn  did 
penance  in  the  church.  He  had,  indeed,  done  a  very  wrong 
thing,  and  the  story  shows  how  beside  the  great  holiness  of 
the  saints  of  the  time  there  was  still  a  terrible  amount  of 
cruelty  and  bloodshed. 

In  the  town  of  Thessalonica,  one  of  the  Emperor's  officers 
had  been  killed  by  the  people.  The  Emperor  pretended  that 
he  was  not  angry,  and  invited  the  people  of  the  town  to 
see  some  games  in  the  circus,  and  when  they  were  all  there 
Theodosius  sent  in  his  soldiers  and  killed  them. 

St.  Ambrose  wrote  some  beautiful  Latin  hymns  which  we 
can  still  read  and  sing,  and  one  of  the  oldest  churches  in  the 
world  is  the  Church  built  in  his  honour  at  Milan. 

In  those  days  when  on  the  death  of  an  emperor  several 


THE  BARBARIANS  AND  THE  EMPIRE     171 

men  often  fought  to  be  made  emperor  in  his  place,  and  when 
the  barbarians  were  continually  breaking  in  and  fighting, 
many  men  fled  to  the  desert  to  become  monks  and  say  their 


THE    CHURCH    OF    ST.    AMBROSE    AT    MILAN 

St.  Ambrose  built  his  church  in  Milan  in  the  fourth  century.     Portions  of  it  are  preserved  in 
the  church  seen  above,  which  is  itself  an  ancient  basilica  church  of  the  twelfth  century. 


prayers  in  peace.  One  of  the  greatest  men  of  this  time  who 
became  a  monk  was  St.  Jerome,  who  put  the  Bible  into 
Latin,  for  these  old  monks  worked  as  well  as  prayed.  He 
lived  the  last  years  of  his  life  in  a  monastery  which  he  made 
at  Bethlehem,  which  he  loved  because  Our  Lord  was  born 
there. 


172  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

St.  Jerome  is  generally  seen  in  pictures  with  the  Bible, 
which  he  translated  into  Latin,  which  was  the  language  which 
all  scholars  then  read.  He  is  sometimes  seen  too  with  a  lion, 
and  the  story  is  that  he  once  saw  a  lion  with  a  thorn  in  its 
paw,  and  instead  of  being  frightened  St.  Jerome  took  the 
thorn  out  and  bandaged  the  paw.  After  that  the  lion  followed 
the  saint  everywhere  like  a  dog. 

There  were  saints  too  like  St.  John  *  Chrysostom,'  or  the 
'golden-mouthed,'  bishop  of  Antioch,  and  then  of  Constan- 
tinople, who  won  his  name  because  of  the  beautiful  way  in 
which  he  spoke  and  preached  to  the  people,  and  St.  Simeon 
Stylites,  who  thought  that  the  best  thing  to  please  God  was 
to  mortify  himself,  and  who  lived  for  years  and  then  died 
on  the  top  of  a  stone  pillar  stretching  up  into  the  sky  in 
the  Syrian  desert. 

But  perhaps  the  greatest  saint  of  all  at  that  time  was 
St.  Augustine  of  Hippo,  a  town  in  North  Africa.  St. 
Augustine  wrote  himself,  in  a  book  called  his  Confessions, 
the  story  of  his  life.  He  tells  how  he  was  brought  up 
tenderly  by  his  mother  Monica,  a  saint  herself,  and  anxious 
that  her  son  might  grow  into  a  good  and  holy  man.  But  when 
he  was  a  boy  and  a  young  man  Augustine  was  not  very  good, 
and  his  mother  wept  often  and  bitterly  over  his  sins. 

But  at  Milan  he  met  St.  Ambrose,  and  listened  to  his  ser- 
mons. He  was  suddenly  filled  with  hatred  for  his  past  life, 
and  changed  it  completely.  He  went  back  to  Hippo,  became 
a  priest,  and  later  bishop  of  Hippo.  His  writings  were  read 
then,  and  are  read  now  by  Christians  everywhere.  His 
greatest  book,  De  Civitate  Dei,  or  The  City  of  God,  was 
written  at  the  time  when  a  barbarian  army  had  entered 
Rome  itself,  and  he  died  when  he  was  seventy-six  years  old, 
when  a  barbarian  army  had  been  besieging  his  city  of  Hippo 
for  three  months,  and  just  in  time  to  escape  seeing  it  taken. 
For  the  barbarians  were  now  spread  all  over  the  Western  part 
of  the  Empire,  and  we  must  now  turn  to  the  story  of  their 
conquests 


THE  BARBARIANS  AND  THE  EMPIRE     173 

The  Emperor  Theodosius  the  Great  died  in  the  year 
395  A.D.,  and  the  Empire  was  divided  between  his  sons 
Arcadius,  who  ruled  the  East,  and  Honorius,  who  ruled  the 
West.  It  was  now  that  the  Visigoths  or  Western  Goths 
who  had  settled  in  the  provinces  round  the  Danube  first  went 
forward  into  Italy  itself. 

They  had  as  their  leader  a  brave  chief  called  Alaric,  but 
they  had  to  fight  hard  battles  against  Stilicho,  the  general 
of  Honorius  in  Italy.  He  was  a  Vandal,  one  of  those  bar- 
barians who  had  been  taken  into  the  Roman  army,  but  he 
fought  well  for  Rome.  He  defeated  Alaric  in  three  great 
battles,  but  the  enemies  of  Stilicho  persuaded  the  Emperor 
that  he  was  a  traitor,  and  Honorius  allowed  him  to  be  put 
to  death.  Two  years  afterwards,  in  the  year  410,  Alaric  led 
his  victorious  army  into  Rome  itself.  It  was  the  first  time 
since  eight  hundred  years  before,  when  the  Gauls  had  burnt 
the  city  and  marched  away,  that  any  enemy  had  got  within 
the  walls  of  Rome.  The  Romans  tried  to  frighten  him  by 
telling  him  how  great  were  their  numbers,  but  he  only 
answered,  *  The  thicker  the  hay  the  easier  mown.'  And  when 
they  asked  him  what  he  would  leave  them,  he  answered, 
*  Your  lives.' 

The  Goths  broke  into  the  beautiful  buildings  of  Rome, 
and  took  for  themselves  the  treasures  which  the  Romans  had 
collected  from  all  parts  of  the  world  in  the  days  when  they 
were  winning  their  empire.  Honorius,  the  Emperor  of  the 
West,  was  a  weak  and  foolish  young  man.  While  the  bar- 
barians were  pouring  into  Rome  he  was  in  the  country  look- 
ing after  the  hens  which  he  kept  and  of  which  he  was  very 
fond.  A  messenger  came  to  tell  him  that  the  end  of  Rome 
had  come.  Now  Honorius  had  a  hen  to  which  he  had  given 
the  name  of  '  Rome.'  '  How  can  that  be,'  he  said,  '  when  I 
have  just  been  feeding  her  ? '  He  seemed  almost  pleased  to 
hear  that  it  was  his  empire  and  not  his  hen  that  he  had  lost. 

Alaric  meant  to  keep  Rome,  but  he  could  not  help 
admiring  the  civihzation  which  he  saw  everywhere  in   the 


174  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

Empire,  and  he  said  he  would  like  to  be  appointed  an  officer 
in  the  service  of  the  Empire.  Many  of  the  barbarian  chiefs 
after  Alaric  did  the  same.  This  did  not  mean  that  they 
obeyed  the  Emperor,  for  they  did  not,  but  they  liked  to  feel 
that  they  had  a  share  in  the  greatness  and  civilization  of  the 
Empire. 

About  the  same  time  as  Alaric  was  conquering  Italy 
the  Vandals  were  overrunning  Gaul  and  Spain,  but  three 
years  after  he  had  taken  Rome  Alaric  died,  and  under  their 
next  ruler  the  Visigoths  marched  out  of  Italy,  followed  the 
Vandals  into  Gaul  and  Spain,  and  drove  them  out  of  those 
countries  into  Africa.  It  was  while  these  Vandals  were  taking 
Africa  for  themselves  that  the  siege  of  Hippo  took  place, 
during  which  St.  Augustine  died. 

The  Vandals  were  one  of  the  roughest  of  these  barbarian 
peoples,  and  they  soon  made  the  North  of  Africa,  which  ever 
since  the  days  of  Alexander  had  been  a  place  of  civilization 
and  learning,  almost  savage  again.  Meanwhile,  the  Visigoths 
had  made  a  kingdom  stretching  all  over  the  South- West  of 
France  and  the  greater  part  of  Spain,  with  its  capital  at  the 
Roman  town  of  Toulouse.  It  seemed  almost  as  though  the 
Visigoths  might  form  a  new  empire  in  the  West,  but  in  the 
end  they  did  not  even  hold  together  as  a  nation.  They  were 
Christians,  but  Arians,  and  it  will  be  seen  later  that  the  bar- 
barians who  were  Arians  were  nearly  always  conquered  by 
those  who  were  Christians  proper.  For  one  reason,  the  people 
whom  they  conquered  were  not  as  a  rule  Arians,  and  there- 
fore disliked  them  more  than  if  they  had  been  of  their  own 
religion. 

Another  Teutonic  people,  the  Franks,  who  became  later  a 
very  great  people  indeed,  now  overran  nearly  all  the  North 
and  central  part  of  France.  They  were  not  yet  Christians  at 
all.  The  Burgundians  made  themselves  a  kingdom  in  the 
South-East  of  Gaul.  So  all  the  provinces  of  the  West,  except 
Italy  itself,  were  now  in  the  hands  of  the  new  peoples. 

It  was  at  this  time  that  the  Roman  legions  left  the  province 


THE  BARBARIANS  AND  THE  EMPIRE     175 

of  Britain.  Britain  was  one  of  the  latest  provinces  won  by  the 
Roman  Empire,  and  in  spite  of  the  great  Roman  roads,  which 
may  still  be  seen  in  this  country  to-day,  and  the  many  towns 
and  colonies  which  the  Romans  had  set  up,  Britain  does  not 
seem  to  have  become  really  Roman  in  its  civilization  like 
France  and  Spain,  which  had  been  so  much  longer  under 
Roman  rule.  So  that  when  the  Angles  and  Saxons  and 
Jutes,  who  were  only  other  branches  of  the  Teutonic  race, 
came  and  conquered  this  country,  while  the  Goths  and 
Vandals  and  Franks  were  conquering  the  other  provinces, 
these  people  learned  very  little  of  Roman  life  and  civilization, 
and  did  not  become  Christians  like  the  barbarian  peoples 
who  conquered  the  other  provinces.  They  still  went  on 
worshipping  their  own  gods — Woden  the  god  of  war,  Thor 
the  god  of  thunder,  and  many  others — until  monks  were  sent 
from  Rome  long  after  to  teach  them  the  true  faith. 

The  reason  that  Italy  was  not  conquered  and  kept  by  the 
barbarians  was  that  the  emperors  were  more  anxious  to  keep 
it,  and  the  barbarians  were  frightened  by  its  past  greatness. 
For  many  years  after  the  other  kingdoms  were  more  or  less 
settled,  the  barbarians  and  the  followers  of  the  emperor  still 
struggled  in  Italy.  Then  there  was  the  great  power  of  the 
Pope  growing  there.  Italy,  in  fact,  was  never  joined  as  a 
nation  under  one  king  until  the  second  half  of  the  nineteenth 
century. 

Attila  the  Hun 

About  the  year  433  a.d.,  Attila,  a  fierce  chief,  became  king 
of  the  Huns,  who  were  still  living  in  the  land  north  of  the 
Danube  to  the  east.  There  their  king  had  built  himself  a 
wooden  palace,  and  from  there  he  led  his  great  army  of 
savages,  each  seated  on  a  shaggy  pony,  right  over  Europe. 

Attila,  we  are  told,  was  a  short,  square  man  curiously  shaped, 
with  a  large  head,  dark  skin,  eyes  set  deep  back  in  his  head, 
and  with  a  flat  nose,  and  very  little  hair.  He  was  cunning 
and  fierce,  and  like  all  the  Huns  he  hated  the  civilization  of 


176 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


the  West.  The  people  called  him  the  '  Scourge  of  God.'  He 
first  attacked  the  Eastern  Empire,  destroying  one  city  after 
another,  until  he  got  to  the  walls  of  Constantinople.  The 
Emperor  paid  him  a  large  sum  of  money,  and  gave  him  an 
enormous  piece  of  land  along  the  Danube  before  he  would  go 
away.  But  the  next  emperor  refused  to  pay  the  tribute,  and 
Attila  then  decided  to  attack  the  Western 
Empire. 

He  rode  across  Europe,  destroying 
cities,  and  killing  the  people  everywhere, 
until  he  was  stopped  at  Orleans,  where 
the  soldiers  were  encouraged  by  the  brave 
bishop  Anianus  to  resist  him.  While  he 
was  here  an  army  came  up  to  fight  him. 
It  was  the  army  of  Theodoric,  king  of 
the  Visigoths,  joined  with  the  army  of 
the  brave  Roman  general  ^tius,  who 
was  trying  to  rule  Italy  for  the  weak  and 
useless  emperors,  who  now  had  their 
capital  at  Ravenna. 

On  the  Plain  of  Chalons,  not  far  from 
Orleans,  Attila  was  completely  defeated. 
The  Visigothic  king  was  killed,  but 
Europe  was  saved.  If  Attila  and  his 
Huns  had  conquered  Europe,  the  civiliza- 
tion which  Rome  had  spread,  and  which 
the  Teutonic  races  were  learning,  would 
have  been  lost,  and  Europe  would  have  become  savage  again. 
Attila  had  to  draw  back  from  Gaul,  but  the  next  year  he 
marched  into  Italy  itself.  JEtius  marched  after  him,  but  was 
not  in  time  to  prevent  many  cities  in  the  North  of  Italy 
from  being  destroyed. 

Many  of  the  people  fled  to  the  islands  and  lakes  in  the 
north  of  the  Adriatic,  and  it  was  from  the  homes  they  built 
themselves  there  that  the  famous  and  beautiful  city  of  Venice 
had  its  beginnings.     The  Emperor  Valentinian  sent  messages 


iETIUS,  THE   ROMAN 

GENERAL    WHO 
DEFEATED    ATTILA 

(From  a  Byzantine  carving 
in  ivory). 


THE  BARBARIANS  AND  THE  EMPIRE     177 

to  Attila,  begging  him  to  go  away.  With  the  messengers 
went  the  great  Pope  Leo,  and  it  was  said  that  Attila  was 
much  struck  by  the  noble  and  beautiful  face  of  the  great 
Pope.  But  it  was  probably  because  his  soldiers  were  tired 
and  ill,  and  because  he  was  offered  a  princess  of  the  Emperor's 
family  as  one  of  his  wives,  and  much  money,  that  he  agreed 
to  go  away.  Fortunately  the  princess  was  saved  from  this 
fate,  for  Attila  died  shortly  afterwards,  after  a  feast  to  celebrate 
another  of  his  mai'riages. 

His  sons  were  not  so  cunning  and  clever  as  Attila,  and 
the  Huns  after  this  moved  eastwards  again,  and  practically 
disappear  from  history.  Just  as  Stilicho  had  been  put  to 
death  by  the  jealous  and  foolish  Emperor  Honorius,  for  whom 
he  had  done  so  much,  so  now  the  equally  foolish  Emperor 
Valentinian  killed  iEtius  with  his  own  hand. 

Shortly  after  this  Genseric,  the  fierce  Arian  king  of  the 
Vandals  in  Africa,  sailed  across  to  Italy  and  attacked  Rome 
itself,  carrying  away  many  treasures,  among  them  the  golden 
table  and  the  golden  candlestick  carried  by  Titus  from  the 
temple  at  Jerusalem,  when  he  destroyed  that  city.  The 
Western  emperors  at  Ravenna  were  becoming  weaker  and 
weaker.  They  were  often  chosen  by  the  general  of  the  bar- 
barian armies  in  Italy.  The  Eastern  emperor  was  sup- 
posed to  give  his  consent,  but  in  the  end  this  was  never 
asked. 

At  last  in  476  Odoacer  the  Herulian,  a  great  barbariao 
general  in  Italy,  made  the  last  emperor  of  the  West  give 
up  his  throne.  This  emperor  was  a  young  boy,  the  son  of 
another  barbarian  adventurer.  He  had  been  given  the  grand 
old  names  of  Romulus,  the  founder  of  Rome,  and  Augustus,, 
its  first  emperor.  But  he  soon  came  to  be  called  in  mockery 
Romulus  Augustulus,  or  the  little  Augustus.  For  a  wonder 
Odoacer  did  not  kill  him,  but  let  him  live  quietly  in  one  of 
the  Italian  towns.  He  sent  the  emperor's  crown  and  robe 
to  the  Emperor  at  Constantinople,  telling  him  that  the  Roman 
Senate  wished  that  the  Western    Empire  should   end,  and 

M 


178  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

declaring    that    they   would    honour    the    one    emperor    at 
Constantinople. 

Of  course  this  did  not  mean  anything.  Odoacer  took  the 
name  of  king,  meaning  to  have  Italy  for  his  own.  The  giving 
up  of  the  name  of  Roman  emperor  by  the  boy  Romulus 
Augustulus  in  476  a.d.  is  often  spoken  of  as  the  moment 
when  the  Roman  Empire  in  the  West  broke  up,  but  we  have 
seen  that  it  had  broken  up  long  before,  and  that  the  barbarians 
had  been  fast  taking  the  lands  of  the  Western  Empire,  and 
making  them  their  own  for  a  hundred  years  before. 


CHAPTER  XVII 

THE  NEW  NATIONS 

We  have  now  reached  the  story  of  that  time  in  history  which 
is  known  as  the  '  Middle  Ages.'  We  give  it  that  name 
because  in  many  ways  it  stands  half-way  between  our  own 
times  and  the  Greek  and  Roman  times  of  which  we  have 
been  speaking.  The  first  few  hundred  years  of  the  Middle 
Ages  are  often  called  the  '  Dark  Ages,'  because  there  was  so 
much  ignorance  and  bloodshed,  and  because  though  the 
Church  did  much  to  civilize  the  barbarians,  yet  the  art  and 
civilization  of  the  Roman  Empire  disappeared,  and  though 
the  barbarians  were  always  learning  from  what  remained,  it 
was  a  long  time  before  the  new  and  wonderful  civilization  of 
the  Middle  Ages  appeared. 

The  history  of  the  early  part  of  the  Middle  Ages  in  the 
West  of  Europe  is  the  story  of  how  the  barbarian  tribes 
settled  down  on  the  lands  of  the  Roman  Empire,  how  they 
fought  between  themselves,  and  how  some  won  and  some 
disappeared,  how  new  nations  appeared  when  the  conquer- 
ing barbarians  married  and  mixed  with  the  peoples  they 
conquered,  how  all  were  Christian,  how  after  a  time  of  much 
ignorance,  and  disorder,  and  bloodshed,  a  new  civilization 
grew  up,  which,  if  rougher  in  some  ways  than  the  Roman  and 
Greek  civilizations,  yet  was  better  than  them,  because  it  was 
Christian.  The  Eastern  Empire,  too,  has  a  wonderful  history 
of  its  own  in  the  early  Middle  Ages,  and  we  must  now  turn 
to  the  story. 

Odoacer,  the  barbarian  soldier,  who  had  made  Romulus 
Augustulus  give  up  his  name  of  emperor,  and  now  called 

179 


180  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

himself  *  King  of  the  Nations '  in  Italy,  did  not  enjoy  his 
position  long.  The  famous  Theodoric,  king  of  the  Ostro- 
goths or  Eastern  Goths,  another  group  of  that  people  who 
had  been  allowed  to  settle  in  the  Roman  provinces  on  the 
Danube,  suddenly  made  up  his  mind  to  take  Italy  for  his 
own.  He  was  a  fine  soldier,  and  his  family,  known  as  the 
Amali,  had  ruled  the  Ostrogoths  for  many  years.  The 
Ostrogoths  had  learned  more  from  Rome  than  any  other  of 
the  barbarians,  and  Theodoric  had  made  up  his  mind  that  if 
he  won  Italy  he  would  rule  it  in  a  wise  and  civihzed  way. 

In  the  year  489  a.d.,  he  led  a  great  army  into  Italy,  and 
made  Odoacer  give  up  his  kingdom.  Soon  after  Odoacer 
was  murdered  at  a  feast.  Probably  Theodoric  had  him  killed, 
thinking  it  would  be  safer  to  have  him  out  of  the  way.  Even 
the  best  men  of  the  time,  at  any  rate  soldiers  like  Theodoric, 
thought  much  less  about  killing  people  than  we  do  now. 
But  when  he  had  won  Italy,  Theodoric  did  his  best  to  rule  it 
well.  He  tried  to  join  the  Goths  and  the  Italians  together 
to  form  a  nation. 

He  ruled  Italy  for  thirty  years,  having  Goths  for  his 
soldiers  and  officers,  but  choosing  the  wisest  and  cleverest 
of  the  conquered  Italians  to  help  him  to  rule  the  country. 
He  lived  chiefly  at  Ravenna,  for  Rome  was  beginning  to 
belong  more  and  more  to  the  Pope,  who  was  growing  more 
powerful  as  time  went  on.  Theodoric  built  beautiful  churches 
and  a  palace  at  Ravenna.  He  married  members  of  his  family 
into  the  families  of  the  other  barbarian  kings,  for  he  hoped  to 
hand  on  his  kingdom  to  his  family,  and  knew  that  it  would 
be  stronger  if  it  had  the  help  of  other  royal  families. 

But  Theodoric  was  an  Arian,  and  like  all  the  other 
barbarians  who  had  become  Arians,  the  Ostrogoths  found 
that  the  conquered  peoples  would  not  mix  with  them.  If 
Theodoric  had  been  a  Christian  proper,  he  might  have 
made  a  kingdom  of  Italy  which  would  have  lasted,  but  this 
was  not  to  be.  At  the  end  of  his  reign,  Theodoric  had  his 
friend  Boethius,  one  of  the  Italians  whom  he  had   had  to 


THE  NEW  NATIONS 


181 


help  him  to  rule  his  kingdom,  cruelly  put  to  death,  because 
he  thought  he  was  plotting  to  help  the  Eastern  emperor  to 
get  Italy  back  again. 

Boethius  was  a  very  good  and   holy  man,  and  had   not 
done  this  thing.     While  he  was  in  prison  he  quietly  gave 


AN    ANCIENT    BYZANTINE    PICTURE    OF    THEODORIC  S    PALACE    AT    RAVENNA 
(From  a  mosaic  in  a  Byzantiue  cliurch  at  Ravenna). 

his  time  to  writing  a  book,  called  The  Consolations  of 
Philosophy.  When  he  was  dead,  Theodoric  was  sorry  for 
what  he  had  done,  and  it  is  said  that  it  was  partly  through 
this  that  he  himself  fell  ill  and  died  soon  after.  Then  the 
Eastern  Emperor  did  try  to  win  back  Italy. 


The  Great  Emperou  Justinian 
The  new  Emperor  Justinian  was  a  very  clever  and  great 
man.  It  is  thought  that  he  belonged  to  a  Slavonic  family, 
but  took  a  Roman  name,  when  he  was  adopted  by  his  uncle, 
the  Emperor  Justin.  Justinian  was  the  greatest  of  all  the 
Roman  emperors  in  the  East.  He  was  ambitious,  and  was 
one  of  those  strong  men  who  are  always  working  and  yet 
are  always  healthy.  He  could  do  with  very  little  sleep,  and 
spent  most  of  the  night  reading  or  writing.  He  often  went 
for  days  without  food,  and  yet  always  looked  bright  and  well, 
and  had  a  red  colour  in  his  face.     .Justinian  had  to  fight  hard 


182  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

against  the  Persians  who  had  risen  up  again  as  a  great  power, 
and  were  threatening  all  the  Roman  provinces  in  Asia  Minor. 
He  kept  them  back  to  the  Euphrates,  but  wasted  years  in 
fighting  them. 

It  would  have  been  better  if  Justinian  had  given  all  his 
strength  to  the  struggle  with  the  Persians,  but  he  could  not 
bear  to  think  that  the  Empire  had  lost  Italy. 

After  the  death  of  Theodoric,  the  Ostrogoth,  Justinian  sent 
a  great  general  called  Belisarius  to  conquer  the  Goths.  The 
Gothic  kings  after  Theodoric  were  not  such  great  men,  and 
in  the  end  Justinian's  generals  won,  but  Italy  did  not 
remain  long  under  the  Eastern  Emperor,  for  when  Justinian 
and  Belisarius  died  both  in  the  same  year,  new  barbarian 
peoples  swarmed  into  Italy.  The  officer  of  the  Eastern 
Empire  remained  at  Ravenna,  and  was  called  the  Exarch, 
but  he  never  had  any  real  power  in  Italy,  and  only  helped  to 
prevent  that  country  becoming  a  nation  like  France  and 
Spain  and  the  other  lands  of  the  Western  Roman  Empire. 

No  sooner  was  Justinian  dead  than  the  Longobards,  another 
Teutonic  people  who  had  been  allowed  to  settle  near  the 
Danube,  rushed  down  upon  the  North  of  Italy.  They  set  up 
their  capital  at  Pavia,  and  under  the  name  of  Lombards, 
which  was  the  Italian  way  of  saying  it,  they  ruled  North 
Italy  for  the  next  two  hundred  years.  But  all  this  time 
there  were  two  other  capitals  in  Italy,  Rome  under  the  Pope, 
and  Ravenna  under  the  Exarch,  who  still  pretended  that  he 
was  ruling  all  Italy  for  the  Eastern  Emperor. 

Justinian  had  attacked  the  Vandal  kingdom  in  North  Africa, 
and  he  did  win  this  back  for  the  Eastern  Empire,  until  it  was 
taken  by  a  new  and  terrible  enemy  whom  we  shall  have  to 
speak  about  later  on.  But  the  name  of  Justinian  is  famous 
for  another  work  which  he  did,  the  results  of  which  have 
lasted  down  to  our  own  times.  The  barbarian  peoples  had 
laws  of  their  own,  but  the  Roman  laws  were  much  better, 
and  most  of  the  new  nations  when  they  settled  down  began 
to  use  these  laws  as  well  as  their  own. 


THE  NEW  NATIONS  183 

Justinian  had  the  Roman  laws  written  down  and  clearly 
arranged.  It  was  a  great  work,  and  we  do  not  know  how 
much  of  it  Justinian  himself  did,  but  in  any  case  it  was  his 
idea.  All  the  nations  of  Western  Europe  except  England 
lived  by  these  laws  all  through  the  Middle  Ages,  and  even 
England  began  to  use  some  of  them  later  on. 

Meanwhile,  the  Visigoths  in  Gaul  had  been  driven 
farther  and  farther  south  by  that  other  Teutonic  people 
which  had  at  first  settled  only  in  the  North  of  France,  These 
were  the  Franks.  When  they  first  took  part  of  Gaul  for  their 
own,  they  were  still  pagans.  They  were  much  fiercer  and 
less  civilized  than  the  Goths,  whom  they  hated. 

About  the  same  time  that  the  Ostrogoths  were  ruled  by 
their  great  king,  Theodoric,  the  Franks,  too,  had  a  great  king 
called  Clovis.  He  was  the  first  great  king  of  the  Franks, 
and  the  only  one  for  many  years.  He  led  his  fierce  soldiers 
against  the  Visigoths,  and  drove  them  before  him  out  of  Gaul 
into  Spain,  and  then  the  whole  of  Gaul  belonged  to  the 
Franks,  and  in  time  took  the  name  France  from  them. 
The  wife  of  Clovis  was  a  Christian,  and  Clovis  had  made  a 
promise  to  God  that  if  he  won  a  certain  battle  he  would 
become  a  Christian  too.  He  did  so,  and  all  his  people  did 
the  same. 

The  Franks  were  Christians  proper,  and  so  had  a  much 
better  chance  of  making  friends  with  the  conquered  people 
than  the  Visigoths  had  had.  In  a  very  short  time  they  settled 
down,  and  took  the  language  and  laws  as  well  as  the  religion 
of  the  conquered  people.  We  must  remember  that  the  Latin 
language  remained  in  all  the  western  provinces  of  the  Empire, 
except  in  England.  Though  the  conquerors  were  Teutonic, 
they  gave  up  their  own  language,  and  spoke  that  of  the  people 
round  them.  Of  course,  some  changes  were  made  in  the 
language ;  but  Italian,  Spanish,  and  French  are  only  new 
forms  of  the  beautiful  Latin  language  which  the  Teutonic 
conquerors  learned  from  the  people  they  conquered. 

The  Visigoths  were  driven  into  Spain,  until  they  in  their 


184  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

turn  were  conquered  by  that  same  enemy  which  overran 
North  Africa,  and  which  for  a  time  threatened  all  Western 
Europe.  But  before  that  time  the  Visigoths  in  Spain  had 
been  converted  from  Arianism  to  Christianity  proper,  and, 
like  the  Franks,  married  and  mixed  with  the  people  they 
had  conquered,  so  that  the  Spanish  nation  to-day,  like 
the  French,  is  descended  from  both  peoples.  In  this  they 
are  very  different  from  the  English  people,  for  as  far  as  we 
can  tell,  the  Angles  and  Saxons  and  Jutes  drove  most  of  the 
Britons  out  of  England  into  Wales,  except  the  few  whom 
they  kept  as  slaves,  so  that  the  English  to-day  are  descended 
from  these  purely  Teutonic  peoples. 

While  the  nations  were  settling  down  great  changes  were, 
of  course,  taking  place.  There  was  still  much  fighting  and 
bloodshed.  The  Church  and  the  bishops  did  what  they  could 
to  civilize  the  people,  but  they  were  still  very  rough.  Very 
few  children  went  to  school,  and  there  was  very  little  learn- 
ing. The  old  Roman  buildings  fell  into  ruins,  though  their 
roads  were  still  used  everywhere.  The  great  theatre,  called 
the  Coliseum  at  Rome,  was  used  as  a  sort  of  quarry  all 
through  the  Middle  Ages,  as  the  people  of  Rome  carried  off 
the  stones  to  build  their  houses  and  churches. 


The  Early  Monks 

The  new  barbarian  peoples  knew  nothing  about  art  or  build- 
ing, and  for  the  first  few  hundred  years  their  churches  were 
quite  small  and  plain.  During  all  this  time  monasteries  were 
being  set  up  all  over  Western  Europe,  and  in  these  the  best 
men  of  the  time  lived,  and  sometimes  set  up  schools  for  boys. 
The  monasteries  were  often  set  up  in  wild  and  lonely  regions, 
but  the  monks  worked  hard  and  cultivated  the  land.  Their 
houses  became  places  of  peace  and  prosperity,  and  served  as  an 
example  to  the  people  in  those  rough  times.  Many  of  these 
monasteries  used  the  'Rule  of  St.  Benedict.'  St.  Benedict 
was  an  Italian  monk,  who  wrote  down  the  way  of  life,  which 


THE  NEW  NATIONS 


185 


he  had  found  good  for  several  monasteries  which  he  had  set 
up  in  Italy. 

It  was  a  very  wonderful  rule,  and  for  many  hundreds  of 
years  after,  the  monasteries,  which  spread  all  over  the  West 
of  Europe,  used  it.  St.  Benedict  wanted  his  monasteries  to 
be  like  families,  where  all  should  work  for  the  good  of  the 
others,  and  all  obey  the  Abbot,  the  head  monk,  who  was  to 
be  a  sort  of  father  to  the  others.  The  name 
'  Abbot '  means  '  Father.'  The  monks  were 
called  Benedictines,  or  as  they  wore  a  plain 
black  habit  or  frock,  they  were  later  called  the 
Black  Monks  of  St.  Benedict.  It  was  one  of 
these  monks,  St.  Augustine,  who  came  first 
to  convert  the  English  to  Christianity,  and 
he  was  sent  by  anotlier  Benedictine  monk  who 
had  become  Pope. 

This  was  Saint  Gregory  the  Great.  Gregory 
was  a  boy  belonging  to  a  rich  and  noble  family 
at  Rome.  He  was  very  clever  and  hand- 
some, and  he  was  given  a  high  position  in  the 
government  of  the  city.  But  he  gave  it  up 
to  become  a  monk  at  the  great  monastery  of 
St.  Andrew  at  Rome,  and  later,  when  the  Pope 
died,  all  the  people  begged  that  Gregory  should 
be  made  Pope  in  his  place.  It  was  before  he 
was  Pope  that  one  day,  as  he  walked  through 
the  market-place  at  Rome,  he  saw  some  beautiful  children 
standing  there,  with  blue  eyes  and  fair  hair  (very  different 
from  the  Italian  children  round  about).  They  were  little 
slave  children  who  had  been  taken  prisoners  in  the  wars 
in  England,  and  were  now  being  sold.  For  in  those  days 
prisoners  were  nearly  always  sold  as  slaves. 

Gregory  asked  who  these  children  were.  He  was  told  that 
they  were  Angles.  But  he  said  they  looked  like  angels,  and 
as  he  knew  that  the  English  were  still  pagans  he  made  up 
his  mind  to  do  all  that  he  could  to  teach  them  the  Christian 


SAINT    GREGORY 
THE    GREAT 

(From  a  mosaic). 


186  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

religion.  When  he  was  Pope,  he  sent  the  monk  Augustine 
with  some  others  to  teach  the  Enghsh  the  true  reUgion. 
St.  Augustine  landed  in  Kent,  because  Ethelbert,  the  king 
of  Kent,  had  married  a  Frankish  princess  who  was  already 
a  Christian. 

Ethelbert  and  all  his  people  became  Christians,  and 
Augustine  built  a  church  at  Canterbury.  But  there  were 
many  other  kingdoms  in  England,  for  Britain  was  not 
conquered  by  one  people  like  France  or  Spain,  but  by 
several  tribes,  and  it  was  many  years  before  all  the  little 
kingdoms  were  joined  together  to  make  one  nation.  One 
of  the  kingdoms,  Mercia,  in  the  middle  of  England,  had  a 
savage  king  called  Penda,  who  hated  the  Christians,  and 
fought  against  them  for  many  years.  In  the  end  he  was 
killed,  but  all  the  preaching  and  teaching  had  to  be  done 
over  again.  This  time  other  monks,  who  were  not  Bene- 
dictines but  came  from  Ireland,  did  the  work. 

Ireland  had  never  been  part  of  the  Roman  Empire.  Its 
people  were  Celts,  but  they  had  been  made  Christians  by 
the  great  St.  Patrick,  another  Celt,  who  left  his  home  in 
Britain  to  convert  the  Irish.  Britain  had,  of  course,  become 
Christian  under  the  Romans.  About  the  time  that  St. 
Benedict  was  setting  up  his  monasteries  in  Italy,  other 
monasteries  were  growing  up  all  over  Ireland,  and  a  great 
Irish  monk,  St.  Columba,  set  out  from  his  own  country  to 
teach  Christianity  to  the  people  in  Scotland.  He  built  a 
great  monastery  on  the  Island  of  lona,  and  it  was  from  there 
that  St.  Aidan  and  other  monks  came  into  the  North  of 
England  to  help  to  make  the  people  Christians. 

The  missionaries  from  lona  did  not  altogether  agree  with 
the  missionaries  from  Rome.  The  Irish  Church  had  been  cut 
off  from  the  other  churches  of  the  West  through  being  so 
far  away,  and  some  differences  had  grown  up.  They  kept 
Easter  at  a  different  time,  for  one  thing.  So  Oswy,  king  of 
Northumbria,  called  a  Synod  or  meeting  of  bishops  and 
priests  at  Whitby  in  664,  and  there  it  was  decided  that  the 


THE  NEW  NATIONS  187 

Roman  way  of  doing  things  should  be  taken,  and  from  this 
time  onwards  the  English  Church  was  closely  connected 
with  the  Popes.  Later,  another  great  man  was  sent  from 
Kome  to  put  order  into  the  English  Church.  This  was 
Theodore  of  Tarsus,  who  became  the  first  Archbishop  of 
Canterbury. 

He  set  up  bishops  in  different  parts  of  England,  all 
under  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  and  when  the  English 
people  were  joined  in  this  way  by  the  Church,  it  became  easier 
for  them  to  join  together  as  one  nation.  England,  too,  was 
soon  covered  over  by  monasteries,  and  her  first  historian,  Bede, 
and  her  first  poet,  Caedmon,  were  both  monks.  In  the  eighth 
century,  that  is,  between  the  years  700  and  800  a.d.,  English 
monks  and  nuns  were  going  out  in  their  turn  to  convert  the 
heathen  peoples  of  Germany,  beyond  the  Rhine.  The  greatest 
of  these  English  missionaries  was  St.  Boniface,  who  spent  the 
greater  part  of  his  life  in  the  work.  But  we  must  now  turn 
to  tell  the  story  of  a  new  danger  which  was  threatening 
Christianity  and  the  civilization  it  was  helping  to  make. 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

The  land  of  Arabia,  a  square  peninsula  lying  as  it  were  on 
the  corner  between  Asia  and  Africa,  with  the  sea  on  three 
sides  of  it,  and  the  desert  on  the  fourth,  had  never  been 
conquered  by  any  of  the  big  empires  of  the  East  or  by  Rome. 
It  was  a  difficult  land  to  get  at,  and  it  had  not  much  to  give 
to  the  conqueror. 

The  Arabs  are  a  Semitic  people,  and  related  to  the 
Jews.  They  have  always  lived  much  the  same  lives  as  they 
do  to-day,  being  shepherds  or  merchants  living  in  tents 
and  carrying  the  things  they  had  to  sell  to  the  coasts  in 
caravans  with  long  strings  of  camels.  The  Arabs  were  at 
one  time  worshippers  of  the  stars,  but  knew  that  there  was 
only  one  God.  Later  on  they  began  to  worship  idols  which 
they  set  up  in  temples. 

It  was  near  one  of  these  temples  in  the  '  Holy  City ' 
of  Mecca  that  the  famous  Mohammed  lived  as  a  boy.  His 
father  was  dead,  and  the  boy  lived  with  an  uncle  who  was  a 
priest  of  the  temple.  Mohammed  lived  a  quiet  life  near  the 
temple,  and  as  he  grew  up  sometimes  travelled  with  the 
caravans  which  went  from  Mecca  to  the  sea-coast.  There 
were  many  Jews  in  Arabia  descended  from  some  who  had 
fled  there  when  Titus  destroyed  Jerusalem. 

It  was  perhaps  from  them  that  Mohammed  got  the  idea 

that    there   was    only   one    God,    and    that    it   was   wrong 

to  worship  idols.     But  he  thought  that  this  was  taught  to 

him  by  God  Himself,  and  that  he  was  meant  to  preach  a 

new  religion.     He  used  to  have  attacks  of  sickness  and  con- 
ies 


THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM     189 

vulsions,  in  which  he  thought  that  God  showed  him  wonder- 
ful things.  He  tried  to  write  them  down  afterwards,  and 
later  they  were  made  into  a  book  called  the  Koran,  which 
Mohammedans  to  this  day  believe  to  be  a  holy  book  like  the 
Bible.  Mohammed  was  married,  and  soon  converted  his  wife 
and  her  relations  to  his  religion. 

His  religion  was  that  there  was  '  one  God  '  and  Mohammed 
was  His  prophet.  At  first  the  people  of  Mecca  were  very 
angry  when  he  spoke  against  their  idols,  for  the  black  stone 
called  the  Kaaba,  which  was  built  into  the  wall  of  their 
temple,  was  visited  each  year  by  numbers  of  pilgrims  from 
all  parts  of  Arabia,  and  this  made  the  city  rich.  The  story 
was  that  this  stone  was  really  the  angel  who  had  been  told 
to  look  after  Adam  in  the  Garden  of  Eden,  and  that  it  had 
been  changed  into  a  stone  as  a  punishment  for  neglecting 
its  duties.  Meanwhile,  it  was  counting  the  kisses  of  the 
people  who  came  to  worship  at  the  temple,  and  when  it 
should  be  changed  into  an  angel  again  at  the  last  day  it 
would  give  an  account  of  them.  So  the  people  of  Mecca 
did  not  like  Mohammed's  teaching  at  all,  and  Mohammed 
thought  it  best  to  run  away. 

His  '  flight,'  as  the  Mohammedans  called  it,  was  in  the  year 
622  A.D.,  and  they  count  that  as  their  year  1  just  as  we  do  the 
year  in  which  Christ  was  born.  Mohammed  fled  to  the  city  of 
Medina,  and  there  a  great  number  of  followers  joined  him 
and  listened  to  his  preaching.  There  were  so  many  of  them 
that  in  a  few  years  Mohammed  led  them  to  Mecca  ready  to 
fight  and  take  the  'Holy  City.'  The  people  of  Mecca  had 
to  give  way,  and  after  this  the  temple  became  the  centre  of 
the  new  religion,  '  Islam '  as  it  was  called. 

Mecca  was  still  a  holy  city  and  a  place  of  pilgrimage, 
and  people  from  all  parts  of  Arabia  still  flocked  to  it. 
When  Mohammed  died  all  the  people  of  Arabia  were 
Mohammedans.  One  of  Mohammed's  followers  became 
head  of  the  new  religion,  and  was  called  the  Kaliph.  And 
now  suddenly  the  Arabs,  who  had  always  lived  so  quietly 


190 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


in  their  own  land,  were  filled  with  a  wish  to  spread  their 
religion.  The  Kaliph  led  great  armies  to  conquer  other  lands, 
and  the  people  who  were  conquered  were  offered  the  choice 
of  three  things.  They  could  become  Mohammedans  or  pay 
tribute.     If  they  refused  these  things  they  must  die. 

To   the  people  of  the   East   the    Mohammedan  religion 
often  seemed  good.     It  was  better  than  the  worship  of  idols. 


A    PILGRIMAGE    TO    THE    GREAT    MOHAMMEDAN    SHRINE    AT    MECCA 

(From  an  old  engraving). 


which  was  the  religion  of  most  of  these  people.  But  to 
Christians  it  seemed  a  terrible  religion,  and  the  Mohammedans 
terrible  people. 

When  the  Kaliph  led  his  armies  out  of  Arabia,  he  went 
first  against  the  great  Persian  Empire.  In  a  short  time  it 
was  conquered  by  the  Arabians,  or  Saracens  as  they  were 
called,  and  they  now  ruled  the  land  even  past  the  Euphrates. 
Soon,  too,  they  conquered  Syria,  which  belonged  to  the 
Eastern  Emperor.  Then  they  turned  to  the  North  of  Africa, 
took  Egypt,  where  they  destroyed  Alexandria,  and  built  the 
city  which  is  now  called  Cairo.     A  Saracen  fleet  was  built 


THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM     191 

and  sailed  the  Mediterranean,  and  soon  the  whole  of  North 
Africa  was  taken,  and  they  crossed  into  Spain. 

It  seemed  that  this  strange  fierce  people  with  their  curious 
half-savage  religion  might  go  on  to  conquer  the  Empire  in 
the  East,  and  overthrow  the  new  nations  in  the  West.  But 
this  was  not  to  be.  The  great  Emperor  of  the  East,  Leo  the 
Iconoclast,  went  out  to  fight  them  when  they  were  attacking 
Constantinople  itself.  He  won  a  great  victory  in  the  year 
718  A.D.,  and  drove  them  out  of  Asia  Minor.  They  did  not 
attack  the  Eastern  Empire  again  for  many  years. 

This  Emperor  Leo  was  called  the  Iconoclast  or  Image- 
breaker  because  he  took  the  part  of  some  of  the  people  in  the 
Eastern  Empire,  who  did  not  like  the  use  of  pictures  or  images 
of  Christ  and  the  saints.  They  thought  that  to  use  them  was 
like  idolatry.  For  a  time  the  iconoclasts  had  their  way,  but 
soon  the  images  were  brought  back. 

Not  many  years  after  the  Saracens  had  been  driven  back 
from  the  walls  of  Constantinople  they  had  conquered  the 
whole  of  Spain.  The  Visigoths  were  driven  back  into  a 
corner  of  the  North- West  of  Spain,  and  now  the  Saracens 
prepared  to  cross  the  Pyrenees  and  conquer  the  kingdom 
of  the  Franks.  But  they  were  defeated  by  the  Frank 
Charles  Martel  at  the  battle  of  Tours  in  732,  and  so  driven 
back  into  Spain. 

The  Franks  had  become  by  this  time  the  greatest 
people  in  the  West  of  Europe.  They  were  splendid 
fighters.  Their  soldiers  went  on  foot,  but  were  protected 
by  mail  shirts  and  shields.  They  stood  close  together,  their 
shields  making  a  sort  of  wall.  Time  after  time  the  Arabs 
dashed  themselves  against  it  until  they  were  tired  out,  and 
then  for  the  first  time  the  Franks  moved,  chasing  the  enemy 
across  the  Pyrenees,  the  mountains  between  France  and  Spain. 

So  the  Arabs  were  held  back  in  both  East  and  West,  but 
they  kept  Spain  and  Africa.  All  through  the  Middle  Ages  the 
Christians  in  Spain  were  fighting  against  the  Arabs.  Bit  by 
bit  the  Spanish  people,  which  was  formed  by  the  mixture  of 


192  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

the  races  which  lived  in  Spain  under  the  Roman  Empire  and 
the  Visigoths  who  had  conquered  them,  drove  the  Arabs 
South,  but  it  was  not  for  seven  hundred  years  that  the  last  of 
the  Moors,  as  the  Spanish  Arabs  were  called,  were  driven  out 
of  Spain  into  Africa. 

The  North  of  Africa,  though  it  was  conquered  by  other 
nations   later,  is  quite   Mohammedan  in  its  people  to  this 
day.      When  the  Saracens  settled  down  in  a  country  they 
often  became  very  civiUzed,  and  the  greatest 
scholars  of  the  early  Middle  Ages  belonged  to 
this  people.      They  studied  the  philosophy  of 
the  Greeks,  and  put  together  a  philosophy  of 
their  own.     They  studied   science   too.     We 
can  best  understand  what  the  Arabian  civiliza- 
tion  was    like   by  a  study  of  their  beautiful 
buildings,  which  may  still  be  seen  in  the  South 
of  Spain.     The  most  beautiful  of  all  perhaps 
is  the  wonderful  palace  called  the  Alhambra, 
with  its  marble  pillars  and  painted  walls.    The 
Moorish    poets    called    it    '  a    pearl    set    in 
FRANKisH  SOLDIERS  cmcralds,'  referring   to   its   whiteness  among 
OF  THE  NINTH      ^      ^.^^^  ^^^^^  ^^  ^j^^  woods  around. 

CENTURY  O 

(From  an  ancient  carving  Charlcs  Martcl,  thc  grcat  Frank  soldier 
i.i'^^li:^  who  drove  the  Arabs  out  of  France  at  the 
^^«^^^)-  battle   of  Tours,  was   not   the   king   of   the 

Franks.  After  the  death  of  Clovis,  the  kings  of  his  family 
who  followed  him  were  very  weak  and  stupid.  They  left  the 
government  of  the  country  very  much  to  their  officers,  called 
the  Mayors  of  the  Palace. 

This  position  was  kept  for  a  long  time  by  one  family, 
and  handed  down  from  father  to  son.  They  became  a  sort 
of  royal  family  themselves,  and  certainly  had  all  the  power. 
The  Franks  by  this  time  had  conquered  a  great  deal 
of  the  land  to  the  East  of  the  river  Rhine,  so  that  their 
kingdom  was  made  up  of  the  country  which  is  now 
France,    and    also    part    of    the     country    which     is     now 


THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM     193 

Germany.  They  were  always  conquering,  too,  the  German 
tribes  further  East,  and  it  was  while  these  conquests 
were  going  on  that  English  monks,  like  St.  Boniface,  went 
among  these  people  to  make  them  Christians.  As  the 
Franks  became  more  and  more  powerful  they  became  more 
friendly  with  the  bishop  of  Rome,  who  was  now  generally 
called  the  Pope,  and  who  was  head  of  all  the  churches  in  the 
West. 

The  Church  in  the  East  sometimes  obeyed  the  Pope, 
too,  but  there  were  always  quarrels  between  them,  and  in 
the  end  the  Eastern  Church  became  divided  from  the 
Western,  and  only  the  Western  Church  obeyed  the  Pope. 
This  state  of  things  has  remained  until  now.  The  Russian 
and  Greek  Churches  believe  in  very  much  the  same  things  as 
the  Catholic  Church,  but  they  will  not  have  the  Pope  as  their 
head.  In  the  West,  however,  the  Pope  was  growing  more 
and  more  powerful.  Kings  and  bishops  from  all  the  nations 
soon  had  to  do  what  he  told  them. 

When  Charles  Martel  died  he  left  his  power  to  two  sons, 
Carloman  and  Pepin.  But  Carloman  chose  to  become  a 
monk,  and  went  off  to  Italy  and  became  a  Benedictine  in  St. 
Benedict's  own  great  monastery  at '  Monte  Cassino.'  So  his 
brother,  who  was  called  Pepin  the  Short,  was  left  to  rule  the 
Frank  kingdom.  Charles  Martel  had  been  king  in  everything 
but  the  name,  and  now  Pepin  took  the  name  of  king  too. 

He  asked  the  Pope  to  help  him  in  this,  and  the  Pope,  who 
was  named  Zacharias,  did  so.  He  said  that  it  was  only  right 
that  he  who  had  the  power  of  a  king  should  have  the  name 
too.  The  king  himself  was  a  weak,  stupid  man,  who  lived  in 
a  kind  of  farm  in  the  country  with  very  few  servants  and  no 
riches  or  magnificence.  Pepin  now  told  him  that  he  must 
give  up  the  throne,  and  to  make  things  quite  safe  he  made 
him  become  a  monk. 

Meanwhile,  the  Pope  was  having  a  great  deal  of  trouble 
with  the  Lombard  people  in  the  North  of  Italy.  They  had 
given   up  their   Arianism  long  before,  but  they  had  never 

N 


194  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

really  settled  down  and  mixed  with  the  Italians.  They 
hated  the  Pope  because  they  wanted  Rome  as  their  own. 
The  Lombard  king  was  threatening  to  attack  Rome  when 
the  Pope  asked  Pepin  to  go  to  his  help. 

Pepin  marched  over  the  Alps,  defeated  the  Lombards, 
took  from  them  a  large  piece  of  land  in  the  middle  of  Italy, 
which  they  had  conquered  from  the  Exarch  of  Ravenna, 
and  gave  it  to  the  Pope.  Before  this  the  Pope  had  only 
had  Rome,  but  this  land  with  others  which  were  added  to  it 
afterwards  became  a  little  kingdom  by  itself,  ruled  by  the 
Pope  and  called  the  Papal  States. 

Once  these  States  were  taken  in  this  way  by  the 
Pope,  there  was  no  chance  of  Italy  becoming  a  nation 
under  one  king  like  England  or  France  or  Spain.  The 
Lombards  had  to  pay  tribute  to  Pepin  for  their  lands  in  the 
North  of  Italy.  Some  years  afterwards  Pepin  died.  He,  too, 
divided  his  kingdom  between  two  sons,  Carloman  and  Charles, 
but  Carloman  soon  died,  and  Charles  became  king  of  the 
Franks.  He  is  one  of  the  greatest  men  of  the  Middle  Ages, 
and  famous  in  history  under  the  name  of  Charles  the  Great. 


CHAPTER  XIX 

CHARLES  THE  GREAT  AND  THE  HOLY  ROMAN  EMPIRE 

Charles  the  Great  is  often  called  Charlemagne,  which  is  a 
French  way  of  saying  his  name,  but  it  must  be  remembered 
that  the  Franks  in  his  days  were  still  more  German  than 
French,  and  soon  Charles  conquered  so  many  lands  that 
France  was  only  a  very  small  part  of  his  empire. 

Charles  was  not  a  little  man  like  his  father,  Pepin  the 
Short.  Indeed,  it  was  said  after  his  death  that  he  was  seven 
feet  high.  He  was  very  handsome,  and  very  clever,  and  in  a 
few  years  he  won  for  himself  an  enormous  empire. 

The  Lombards,  under  a  new  king,  were  worrying  the 
Pope  again,  and  Charles  marched  across  the  Alps  to  help 
him.  The  Lombards  were  conquered,  Didier  their  king  was 
forced  to  go  into  a  monastery,  and  Charles  the  Great  became 
king  of  the  Lombards. 

Then  Charles  turned  against  the  Saxon  tribes  between 
the  rivers  Rhine  and  Elbe,  and  conquered  them  too.  He 
made  them  all  become  Christians,  and  added  their  land  to  his 
empire,  but  it  took  thirty  years  of  terrible  wars  to  finish 
the  conquest.  Charles  conquered  also  the  terrible  Avars, 
a  people  related  to  the  Huns,  and  very  like  them.  They 
had  overrun  the  country  of  Bavaria,  but  Charles  practically 
destroyed  them,  and  added  Bavaria  to  his  empire,  so  that  it 
now  stretched  right  across  the  middle  of  Europe.  He  also 
crossed  into  Spain,  and  drove  the  Saracens  south  as  far  as  the 
river  Ebro. 

There  is  a  famous  French  poem,  written  in  the  Middle 
Ages,  called  the  *  Chanson  de  Roland,'  which  tells  a  story 
of  Charles's  war  against  the  Saracens  in  Spain.     The  story 

195 


196  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

tells  (but  we  are  not  sure  how  true  it  is)  that  Roland 
was  the  nephew  of  Charles,  and  fought  with  him  against 
the  Saracens.  As  they  were  crossing  the  Pyrenees  back  into 
France,  Roland  was  at  the  very  back  of  the  army.  Charles 
had  gone  on  before,  when  suddenly  a  great  army  of  Saracens 
appeared  on  a  mountain-top  between  them. 

Roland  had  only  a  few  men,  and  his  friends  advised  him 
to  blow  his  horn  and  bring  Charles  back  to  help  him. 
But  he  was  too  brave  to  do  this,  and  made  up  his  mind  to 
fight  the  great  Saracen  army  with  his  few  men.  He  did  so, 
and  all  day  they  fought,  killing  many  Saracens,  but  being 
nearly  all  killed  themselves.  At  last  Roland  blew  his  horn, 
and  Charles  heard  it  far  away,  and  wanted  to  turn  back, 
but  an  enemy  of  Roland  told  him  it  was  only  the  sound  of 
the  wind.  Twice  more  Roland  blew,  but  the  last  time 
it  was  when  he  was  dying,  and  all  his  men  were  dead. 
Charles  turned  back  to  help  him,  but  found  him  dead. 
He  loved  Roland  dearly,  and  was  almost  heartbroken. 

There  was  another  enemy  whom  Charles  dreaded  more 
than  any  others.  These  were  the  terrible  Northmen  or 
Vikings  from  Norway  and  Sweden  and  Denmark.  They 
were  a  Teutonic  people  too,  and  now  when  the  Teutons  in 
the  rest  of  Europe  had  been  settling  down  for  hundreds  of 
years  they  suddenly  began  to  move,  and  for  the  next  two 
hundred  years  were  constantly  attacking  the  countries  of 
Western  Europe.  We  shall  see  later  how  dreadfully  these 
Northmen  or  Danes  attacked  the  English.  In  Charles's  time 
they  were  already  attacking  the  Northern  coasts  of  his 
empire,  and  after  his  death  they  conquered  and  settled  down 
on  parts  of  it. 

Charles  was  a  very  good  and  holy  man.  He  was  anxious 
that  all  the  people  of  his  empire  should  be  good  Christians. 
He  made  good  laws,  and  tried  to  keep  order  through  all  his 
empire.  He  was  always  a  great  friend  of  the  Pope,  and 
was  called  the  '  Most  Christian  King,'  and  '  Defender  of  the 
Church.' 


CHARLES  AND  THE  HOLY  ROMAN  EMPIRE    197 


At  last  he  received  the  highest  title  of  all,  that  of 
Roman  Emperor,  which,  as  we  have  seen,  had  been  given 
up  more  than  three  hundred  years  before.  Charles  had  now 
an  enormous  empire,  and  perhaps  he  himself  was  anxious  to 
have  the  name  of  Emperor.  We  do  not  know,  but  this  is 
how  he  got  it  at  last. 

On  Christmas  Day  in  the  year  800,  the  emperor  was 
kneeling,  saying  his  prayers  before  the  Tomb  of  St.  Peter 
in  the  church  of  St.  Peter  at  Rome, 
when  Pope  Leo  iii.  suddenly  placed 
a  golden  crown  on  his  head,  and 
all  the  people  cheered  and  cried  out 
the  name  of  the  Emperor.  There 
was  no  Emperor  of  the  East  at 
that  time,  but  an  empress.  How- 
ever, Charles  and  the  emperors  in 
the  West  who  came  after  them 
were  never  emperors  in  the  old 
way.  Sometimes  they  were  power- 
ful, and  sometimes  they  were 
not.  Later  on  in  the  Middle 
Ages  there  were  terrible  strug- 
gles between  the  '  Holy  Roman 
Emperors,'  as  the  Emperors  of 
the  West  came  to  be  called,  and 
the  Popes,  as  each  wanted  to  be 
more  powerful  than  the  other. 

It  was  a  very  difficult  question  to  settle.  The  Emperor 
could  only  be  crowned  by  the  Pope,  and  yet  when  he  was 
crowned  the  Pope  had  to  bow  before  him. 

The  proud  popes  of  the  later  Middle  Ages  would  do  no 
such  thing.  Some  of  the  emperors  expected  the  Pope  to 
do  just  what  they  told  him  to,  and  so  there  were  terrible 
struggles  between  them.  But  this  was  not  so  with  Leo 
and  Charles.  They  worked  together  for  the  good  of  the 
people  and  the  good  of  the  Church. 


CHARLES    THE    GREAT 

(From  a  bust  on  his  tomb  in  the  church  he 
built  at  Aix-la-Chapelle). 


198  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

Charles  lived  to  enjoy  his  empire  until  he  was  seventy 
years  old,  and  was  then  buried  sitting  on  a  marble  throne 
in  a  vault  beneath  the  beautiful  church  he  had  built  near 
his  palace  in  the  city  of  Aachen  or  Aix-la-chapelle.  He  had 
ruled  so  well  and  lived  so  simple  a  life  that  the  people  looked 
on  him  as  almost  a  saint.  When  he  was  not  fighting  he 
gathered  scholars  around  him  in  his  palace.  While  he  was 
at  meals  he  would  have  some  one  reading  or  playing  to  him. 
He  ate  well,  but  drank  very  little,  and  cared  nothing  at  all  for 
luxury  or  magnificence.  His  whole  life  was  given  to  the 
service  of  the  Church  and  the  people  of  the  great  empire 
he  had  built  up.  He  has  always  been  one  of  the  great  heroes 
of  the  Middle  Ages. 

Charles  the  Great  died  in  the  year  814,  and  his  son  Lewis 
the  Pious  became  emperor  after  him.  Lewis  was  a  very  good 
and  holy  man,  and  tried  to  rule  the  Empire  well.  But  he 
was  struggling  during  the  whole  of  his  reign  with  the  people 
who  wanted  the  Empire  after  him.  At  first  he  had  three 
sons  and  one  nephew,  and  he  arranged  for  the  Empire  to  be 
divided  between  them  when  he  died,  the  first  son  to  be 
emperor. 

But  his  nephew,  a  young  man  named  Bernard,  wanted 
to  have  Italy  for  himself,  even  while  his  uncle  was  still 
alive.  He  rose  in  rebellion  against  Lewis,  but  was  defeated, 
and  by  order  of  the  Emperor  he  had  his  eyes  put  out,  and 
soon  afterwards  died.  This  shows  how  cruel  even  a  good 
man  like  Lewis  could  be  in  those  days.  Afterwards  Lewis 
knelt  humbly  at  the  feet  of  the  Pope  and  asked  pardon 
for  this  sin.  Later,  Lewis  married  a  second  time  and  had 
another  young  son.  His  elder  brothers  did  not  want  this 
boy  to  have  any  of  the  lands  of  the  Empire,  and  when  their 
father  arranged  a  kingdom  for  him,  they  gathered  an  army 
to  fight  him. 

Before  the  battle  many  of  the  Emperor's  friends  went 
over  to  fight  on  his  sons'  side  against  him,  and  afterwards 
the   meeting-place   was   called   the   '  Field    of    Lies.'      The 


CHARLES  AND  THE  HOLY  ROMAN  EMPIRE    199 

Emperor  was  taken  prisoner  and  shut  up  in  a  monastery. 
The  sons  tried  to  make  him  give  up  his  throne,  but  he  would 
not.  After  a  time  Lewis  got  free  again  and  defeated  his 
sons  before  he  died,  but  it  was  a  very  sad  ending.  After 
liis  death,  and  after  many  quarrels  between  the  sons,  the 
great  empire  was  broken  up  into  three  kingdoms,  which 
were  really  France,  Germany,  and  Italy  with  a  small  part  of 
the  South  of  France.  This  division  did  not  last  long.  There 
were  many  more  changes,  but  in  the  end  France  became 
a  separate  kingdom  from  Germany.  Generally  whichever 
king  had  Italy  as  part  of  his  kingdom  was  called  the 
Emperor.  Sometimes  there  was  no  Emperor  at  all.  Mean- 
while great  changes  were  taking  place  all  over  Western 
Europe. 


CHAPTER  XX 

THE  DAYS  OF  THE  NORTHMEN 

In  the  days  after  the  death  of  Charles  the  Great,  while  his 
grandsons  and  their  sons  were  fighting  over  his  lands,  the 
Northmen  or  Danes  whom  he  had  dreaded  so  much  were  sail- 
ing the  seas  and  attacking  the  countries  of  the  West  in  greater 
numbers  than  ever.  They  would  sail  up  the  mouths  of  rivers, 
attack  the  cities,  carrying  off  all  the  best  things  from  the 
houses  and  the  richest  treasures  of  the  churches.  Then  they 
would  sail  away  again. 

In  this  way  they  sailed  up  the  mouths  of  the  French 
rivers  and  the  rivers  of  the  North  of  Germany.  They  came 
to  England,  too,  and  robbed  and  burned  for  many  years. 
Then  there  came  a  time  when  these  fierce  men  of  the 
North  came  and  conquered  and  did  not  go  away  again. 
They  were  great  tall  men,  fierce  and  uncivilized,  and  still 
of  course  pagans.  In  fact,  they  were  very  much  like  the 
Franks  and  the  Angles  and  Saxons  who  had  overrun  Gaul  and 
Britain  four  hundred  years  before.  In  France  the  Northmen 
nearly  took  Paris  for  their  people,  but  they  were  driven  back 
by  Count  Robert  the  Strong. 

The  French  kings,  the  descendants  of  Charles  Martel 
and  Pepin  and  Charles  the  Great,  had  become  weak  and 
stupid  just  as  the  family  of  Clovis  had  done.  One  of  them 
who  ruled  both  Germany  and  France  for  a  time  was  called 
Charles  the  Fat,  and  he  went  mad  before  his  death. 
Another  of  this  family  who  was  king  of  France  was  called 
Charles  the  Simple.  A  king  like  this  was  of  no  use  against 
the  fierce  Northmen,  but  the  Counts  of  Paris  helped  these 


THE  DAYS  OF  THE  NORTHMEN 


201 


weak  kings  just  as  the  Mayors  of  the  Palace  had  ruled  for  the 
family  of  Clovis. 

Under  Rolf  or  Rollo,  a  fierce  chief,  the  Northmen  were 
allowed  to  settle  down  in  the  land  round  Rouen,  which 
they  had  seized  and  which  became  the  Duchy  of  Normandy. 
Rolf  was  called  '  Rolf  the  Ganger ' 
or  walker,  because  he  always  went 
on  foot,  as  no  horse  was  strong 
enough  to  carry  him.  The  North- 
men showed  themselves  very  clever 
in  learning  the  ways  of  the  new 
countries  they  settled,  and  in  Nor- 
mandy especially  showed  themselves 
a  brave  and  brilliant  people.  Mean- 
while other  Northmen,  or  Danes 
as  they  were  generally  called,  had 
settled  down  in  England. 

The  Great  King  Alfred 

When  they  began  to  attack  Eng- 
land in  earnest,  the  kings  of  Wessex 
had  for  the  first  time  joined  all  the 
little  kingdoms  into  which  England 
had  been  so  long  divided  into  one 
kingdom.  There  were  still  kings  of  a 
Northumbria  and  Mercia,  but  they 
were   under  the   king   of    Wessex.  chades  the  Baid,  who  ruled  from  823 

^^^,  11-^  •  1*^^  ^'^'''     (Drawn  from  a  picture  in   a 

When  the  Danes  came,  it  was  the     Bible  presented  to  the  king  in  869). 
king  of  Wessex  who  had  to  fight 

tliem.  It  was  as  king  of  Wessex  that  the  great  King  Alfred 
fought  the  Danes  and  kept  them  from  conquering  the  whole 
of  England.  After  many  years  of  fighting,  Alfred  made  peace 
with  the  Danish  King  Guthrun,  but  even  then  he  had  to  give 
up  the  whole  of  the  East  of  England  to  the  Danes. 

It  was  called  the  Danelaw  and  in  it  the  Danes   settled 


KING    OF   FRANCE    WHO  FOUGHT 
AGAINST    THE    NORTHMEN 


202  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

down,  and  lived  at  peace  with  the  English  just  as  the  other 
Northmen  had  done  in  Normandy.  Guthrun,  the  Danish 
king,  had  been  baptized,  and  Alfred  was  his  godfather.  All 
the  Danes  of  course  became  Christians  like  their  king. 
Alfred  was  able  to  rule  his  own  people  in  peace.  In  some 
ways  he  was  very  much  like  Charles  the  Great,  but  he 
was  a  better  man  in  many  ways,  especially  in  his  own  private 
life. 

Like  Charles,  he  made  good  laws  and  tried  to  keep  his 
people  safe  and  happy.  He  himself  wrote  things  in  English 
which  they  might  read.  It  was  he  who  began  the  English 
Chronicle  in  which  the  history  of  England  began  to  be  written 
down  for  the  first  time.  Like  Charles,  he  set  up  schools  and 
monasteries.  He  built  ships,  too,  to  keep  England  safe  from 
any  more  attacks. 

Alfred  was  the  greatest  of  the  early  English  kings.  The 
kings  who  came  after  him  tried  to  go  on  with  his  work,  and 
in  time  they  conquered  the  whole  of  England,  even  the  part 
which  had  been  given  to  the  Danes.  The  last  of  these  great 
kings  was  Edgar  the  Peaceful,  and  it  is  told  of  him  how  six 
under-kings  rowed  him  up  the  river  Dee  to  the  church  of 
St.  John  at  Chester. 

But  after  Edgar  came  theweak  king'Ethelred  the  Unready.' 
The  Danes,  who  had  now  settled  in  kingdoms  of  their  own  in 
Norway,  and  Sweden,  and  Denmark,  began  to  come  again, 
and  Ethelred,  instead  of  fighting  them,  gave  them  money  to  go 
away.  Then  he  did  a  very  dreadful  and  foolish  thing.  He  had 
many  of  the  Danes  who  were  already  in  England  murdered  on 
St.  Brice's  Day  in  the  year  1002.  The  Danes  from  Denmark 
came  to  punish  Ethelred,  and  he  was  driven  out  of  the  country. 
Danish  kings  now  ruled  England,  the  most  famous  being  the 
great  king  Canute,  who  was  almost  a  saint.  But  not  many 
Danes  came  with  him,  and  they  did  not  alter  the  English 
ways  of  doing  things  or  the  English  language. 

After  a  time  England  got  English  kings  again,  the  last 
of  them  being  Edward  the  Confessor,  who  was  a  saint,  but 


THE  DAYS  OF  THE  NORTHMEN 


203 


a  weak  king.  After  him,  Earl  Harold  took  the  throne,  but 
was  killed  by  the  Norman  Duke  William  at  the  battle  of 
Hastings ;  so  the  Northmen  again  ruled  England,  but  the 
story  of  William  the  Conqueror  will  come  later  on. 

While  the  Northmen  were  attacking  the  West  countries,  the 
Magyars,  a  wild  tribe  like  the  Huns,  were  attacking  Germany 
on  the  East  and  the  Saracens  were  overrunning  Sicily  and 
Italy.  One  result  of  all  this  danger,  and  also  of  the  disorder 
after  the  empire  of  Charles  the  Great  was  divided  up,  was  the 
growth  of  what  is  called  the  Feudal  System. 

In  the  Feudal  System,  all  the  land  of  any  country  belongs 
to  the  king.  He  gives  large 
pieces  out  to  his  nobles,  who 
must  do  him  '  homage '  for 
them.  They,  in  their  turn 
give  their  lands  out  to  other 
men,  knights  and  others  who 
become  their  '  men,'  and  have 
to  do  them  homage  and  fight 
for  them,  just  as  they  have  to 
do  homage  to  the  king  and 
fight  for  him.  The  poorest 
people  of  all  under  the  Feudal  System  were  '  serfs.' 

They  were  not  exactly  slaves.  They  lived  on  a  small 
piece  of  land  on  which  they  could  grow  things  for  them- 
selves, but  they  had  also  to  work  on  the  land  of  their  lords. 
They  could  not  be  sold  like  slaves,  but  they  were  not  free 
to  go  from  one  master  to  another,  but  had  always  to  stay 
on  the  land  and  work  for  the  lord  who  owned  it.  They  could 
not  do  anything,  such  as  getting  married  or  sending  their 
children  to  school,  without  permission  from  their  lord.  There 
were  not  many  schools  then,  of  course,  but  sometimes  even 
the  sons  of  serfs  were  chosen  to  go  to  the  schools  at  the 
monasteries.  Generally  they  would  become  monks,  but  this 
could  only  be  with  the  permission  of  the  lords. 

In  the  days  when  enemies  like  the  Danes  were  threaten- 


NORMAN    SOLDIERS    ATTACKING    A    CASTLE 
BY    SEA 


204  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

ing  the  lands,  it  often  seemed  safer  for  free  men  to  put  them- 
selves under  the  protection  of  some  great  lord  who  lived 
near.  They  would  give  their  land  up  to  the  lord  and 
receive  it  back  as  his  '  man.'  It  was  in  this  way  that  the 
Feudal  System  grew.  Although  the  king  was  supposed  to 
be  at  the  head  of  all,  for  many  years  it  was  the  great  lords 
.who  had  all  the  power.  This  was  so  in  France  and  also  in 
Germany,  where  some  of  the  *  Counts  '  whom  Charles  the 
Great  had  set  up  to  rule  different  parts  of  the  country  took 
the  lands  for  themselves  when  he  died. 

In  England  when  William  the  Conqueror  came  the 
Feudal  System  had  begun  to  grow,  chiefly  through  the  power 
which  the  great  nobles  got  during  the  weak  rule  of  Edward 
the  Confessor.  All  through  the  Early  Middle  Ages,  when 
the  great  nobles  everywhere  were  fighting  against  each  other, 
the  poor  people  suffered  very  much.  The  Church  did  all  it 
could  to  make  things  better  for  them.  When  on  their 
deathbeds,  men  were  persuaded  to  set  their  serfs  free. 
Feudalism  was  useful  in  the  days  when  it  first  grew  up,  when 
the  rich  men  fought  for  the  poor  against  the  enemies  of  both. 

But  it  meant  that  every  great  lord  was  a  soldier  and  in 
some  ways  a  king.  He  could  always  call  his  knights  to 
fight  for  him  against  some  other  lord,  and  the  people  were 
made  miserable  by  the  continual  fighting.  The  Church  tried 
to  make  things  better  by  getting  the  great  nobles  to  agree  to  a 
'  Truce  of  God.'  This  meant  that  they  would  stop  fighting 
for  some  fixed  time.  It  might  be  from  Wednesday  evening 
to  Monday  morning  in  each  week,  or  from  the  beginning  of 
Lent  until  after  Easter.  Or  again  the  lords  might  be  asked 
to  promise  that  they  would  not  attack  priests,  or  merchants, 
or  Jews,  or  women.  It  must  have  been  a  great  relief  to  the 
people  when  the  lords  agreed  to  a  '  Truce  of  God.' 

In  the  Early  Middle  Ages  every  gentleman  who  was  not 
a  priest  was  a  soldier,  and  many  were  called  knights.  Though 
they  were  often  cruel  to  each  other  and  to  the  poor  people,  the 
best  of  them  were  kind  and  good,  especially  to  women      The 


THE  DAYS  OF  THE  NORTHMEN 


205 


Church  tried  to  teach  the  knights  to  do  what  was  right,  and 
sometimes  a  knight  was  given  his  sword  and  armour  with  the 
blessing  of  the  Church.  Often  he  had  knelt  through  the  whole 
of  the  night  before  praying  in  the  church.  The  worst  sides  of 
feudalism  were  put  down  later  on  in  the  Middle  Ages  when 
the  kings  grew  stronger,  especially  in  England  and  France. 
In  France,  Hugh  Capet,  the  Count  of  Paris,  became  king 


MAKING    A    KNIGHT    IN    THE    MIDDLE    AGES 

After  he  had  spent  the  night  in  vigil  in  the  church,  the  young  knight  had  his  sword  buckled 

on  by  the  king,  while  others  invested  him  in  spurs,  shirt  of  mail,  banner  and  shield.     (From  a 

drawing  by  Matthew  Paris,  a  famous  English  monk  and  historian  about  1200). 


in  the  year  987.  At  first  he  had  very  little  more  power  than 
the  duke  of  Normandy  or  the  other  great  feudal  lords  in 
France  with  their  strong  castles  and  their  armies  ready  to 
fight  for  them.  But  in  time  the  French  kings  grew  stronger 
and  stronger,  and  were  able  to  keep  the  great  lords  in  order, 
and  joined  the  whole  of  France  into  a  strong  and  great 
kingdom. 

The  End  of  the  'Dark  Ages' 

In  Germany  the  descendants  of  Charles  the  Great  were 
dead,  and  one  of  the  dukes  of  the  four  great  Duchies  into 


206  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

which  his  German  lands  were  divided  became  king  of 
Germany.  One  of  the  greatest  of  these  was  Otto,  son  of 
Henry  the  Fowler  of  Saxony.  It  was  he  who,  in  the  great 
battle  of  Lechfield,  at  last  conquered  the  Magyars,  who 
settled  down  and  mixed  with  the  people  in  Hungary,  which 
now  became  a  kingdom.  The  Magyars  became  Christians, 
and  fifty  years  later  had  a  saint  for  their  king. 

New  kingdoms  were  being  made  all  over  the  North  and 
East,  where  at  last  the  people  were  settling  down  as  they 
had  already  done  in  the  West.  We  have  seen  how  the  Danes 
had  made  the  kingdoms  of  Norway,  Sweden,  and  Denmark. 
The  Slavonic  kingdom  of  Poland  was  made  in  the  tenth 
century.  Then  Northern  pirates  attacked  the  country  we 
now  call  Russia,  and  mixed  with  the  Slavonic  tribes  to  form 
a  great  kingdom  there.  And  all  these  new  peoples  became 
Christians  in  a  very  short  time,  for  missionaries  from  East  or 
West  went  to  convert  them.  Russia  was  converted  by  the 
Eastern  Church,  to  which  it  has  belonged  ever  since.  With 
the  settlement  of  all  these  peoples  one  of  the  great  dangers 
which  had  threatened  the  nations  of  the  West  all  through  the 
Early  Middle  Ages  was  over. 

All  this  time  Italy  had  been  full  of  disorder.  The  North 
had  been  broken  up  among  several  dukes.  The  Popes  ruled 
Rome  and  the  middle  of  Italy,  while  the  South  was  divided 
between  the  Greeks  and  Saracens.  After  the  death  of 
Charles  the  Great  the  Popes  had  seemed  more  powerful  than 
ever. 

Pope  Nicholas  i.  especially  was  very  much  like  the  Popes 
who  came  later  in  the  Middle  Ages,  and  who  claimed  power 
over  kings  and  bishops  alike.  But  by  the  time  of  the  Emperor 
Otto  the  Great  the  Popes  had  become  very  weak  and  wicked, 
and  Otto  made  up  his  mind  to  go  into  Italy  and  put  all  things 
right  again.  He  first  interfered  in  the  North,  where  a  great 
struggle  was  going  on  for  the  Lombard  Crown.  Otto  went 
to  the  help  of  a  young  and  beautiful  woman,  Adelaide  of 
Burgundy,  whose  husband  had  died  while  he  was  trying  to 


THE  DAYS  OF  THE  NORTHMEN 


207 


have  himself  made  king.  Adelaide  was  put  in  prison  by  one 
of  his  enemies.  Otto  now  went  into  Italy,  took  the  crown 
for  himself,  and  being  a  widower  himself  he  married  Adelaide. 

Ten  years  later,  in  962,  when  he  had  gone  to  Italy  for  a 
second  time,  he  had  himself  crowned  emperor  by  the  Pope, 
John  XII.,  who  had  begged  for  his  help  against  his  enemies. 
Otto  was  anxious  to  set  up  good  Popes  again,  and  did  so.  He 
was  the  friend  of  the  monks  of  the  new 
order  of  Cluny,  which  was  doing  its 
best  to  make  the  Church  and  the 
people  better  and  holier.  The  monas- 
tery of  Cluny  in  the  middle  of  France 
had  been  set  up  by  William  the  Pious, 
a  French  duke,  and  under  its  abbot 
Otto  had  been  made  very  strict.  Many 
of  the  Benedictine  abbeys  had  by  this 
time  forgotten  to  do  most  of  the  things 
which  they  were  told  to  do  in  the  Rule 
of  St.  Benedict. 

But  the  abbot  of  Cluny  set  up  new 
monasteries,  and  got  some  of  the  old 
ones  to  join  him.  All  the  monasteries 
belonging  to  Cluny  had  to  obey  the 
abbot  of  Cluny.  The  old  Benedictine 
monasteries  had  been  quite  independent 
of  each  other,  so  that  if  an  abbot  was 
not  good  or  did  not  mind  the  rule  there  was  no  one  to  keep 
him  in  order.  The  monks  of  Cluny  did  not  work  in  the 
fields  like  the  Benedictine  monks  had  done,  but  they  had 
longer  time  for  prayers  and  lived  very  simply. 

The  setting  up  of  this  new  order  of  monks  shows  that 
there  was  a  new  feeling  for  religion  growing  up  at  the  end 
of  the  '  Dark  Ages.'  The  spread  of  the  order  helped  to  make 
the  feeling  stronger.  In  a  short  time  the  Church  every- 
where became  stronger  and  better.  The  new  Popes  were 
quite  different  from  the  Popes  before  Otto  the  Great  was 


THE    EMPEROR    OTTO 
(From  a  statue  on  his  tomb). 


208  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

crowned  emperor.  With  the  '  Cluniac  Reform,'  as  it  was 
called,  a  change  seems  to  come  over  the  times,  and  we 
find  ourselves  in  the  Middle  Ages  proper,  with  their  great 
soldiers  and  saints,  and  wonderful  churches,  and  castles,  and 
schools,  and  monasteries.  It  is  a  time  above  all  of  wonderful 
adventure  and  romance,  and  we  must  now  tell  something  of 
its  story. 


CHAPTER   XXI 

THE  GREAT  POPE  HILDEBRAND 

The  greatest  time  of  the  Middle  Ages  was  the  thirteenth 
century,  that  is,  the  time  between  the  years  1200  and  1300 
A.D.  It  was  the  time  of  great  popes,  and  great  kings  and 
saints,  but  for  two  hundred  years  before  this  people  had  been 
becoming  more  civilized,  and  times  were  changing.  These 
changes  took  place  in  all  the  countries  of  Western  Europe, 
but  perhaps  they  are  more  easily  noticed  in  England. 

In  the  year  1066  there  happened  in  England  a  great  thing 
which  helped  to  bring  these  changes  about.  This  was  the 
Norman  Conquest,  when  the  great  William,  duke  of  Normandy, 
came  over  to  England,  and  had  himself  crowned  king  of 
England.  Edward  the  Confessor,  the  last  real  English  king, 
had  been  brought  up  in  Normandy,  and  loved  the  Norman 
people  and  the  Norman  ways.  He  was  a  very  good  man,  a 
saint,  in  fact,  and  had  a  very  gentle  face  and  a  long  white 
beard.  He  was  a  friend  of  Duke  William  of  Normandy,  and 
promised  that  he  should  be  king  of  England  when  Edward 
died,  as  he  had  not  any  children  to  reign  after  him. 

Duke  William  was  a  tall  dark  man,  with  a  handsome  but 
stern  face  and  strong  like  a  giant.  When  the  news  came  to 
him  that  Edward  of  England  was  dead  he  cried  out,  '  Then 
England  is  mine.'  But  the  English  had  chosen  for  their  king 
an  English  earl  named  Harold.  He  was  a  short  fair  man  with 
a  handsome  face  and  smiling  blue  eyes.  He  had  long  fair  hair 
hanging  in  curls  to  his  shoulders,  for  that  was  how  the  young 
Englishmen  wore  their  hair  at  that  time.     They  had  some- 

o 


210  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

times  beards  too,  but  the  Normans  had  short  hair  and  shaven 
faces. 

When  WilHam  heard  that  Harold  had  been  chosen  king 
of  England  he  was  very  angry  and  made  up  his  mind  to 
come  and  take  England  from  him.  He  was  especially  angry, 
because  a  short  time  before  Harold  had  been  wrecked  on  the 
coast  of  Normandy,  and  Wilham  had  made  him  promise  to 
help  him  in  making  himself  king  of  England.  If  he  had  not 
made  this  promise  Wilham  would  not  have  let  him  go,  so 
Harold  promised ;  but  he  did  not  feel  that  he  was  bound  to 
keep  his  promise,  and  now  he  had  been  chosen  king  himself. 
William  got  together  a  fleet  and  went  over  the  sea  to  fight 
Harold.  Harold  was  fighting  another  enemy  in  the  North  of 
England  when  he  heard  that  William  with  a  great  army  of 
Norman  soldiers  was  at  Hastings  in  the  South.  He  at  once 
marched  South,  and  the  great  battle  of  Hastings  was  fought. 

Both  sides  fought  splendidly,  but  the  English  were  tired 
with  their  long  march.  At  the  end  of  the  day  only  the  soldiers 
of  Harold's  guard  were  left  fighting  around  him  beside  his 
standard,  where  he  had  set  it  up  at  the  top  of  the  hill.  Then 
at  last  William  told  his  foot-soldiers  to  shoot  high  above  the 
heads  of  the  Englishmen  so  that  the  arrows  might  strike  their 
heads  and  faces.  An  arrow  pierced  Harold's  eye,  and  he  fell 
at  the  foot  of  his  standard.  He  was  killed  immediately  and 
his  friends  with  him,  and  so  William  won  England  for  himself 

He  had  the  body  of  Harold  put  under  a  heap  of  stones 
on  the  cliff  at  Hastings,  but  it  was  afterwards  taken  away  and 
buried  by  the  priests  of  the  church  of  Holy  Cross  at  Waltham 
which  Harold  had  built.  For  Harold  was  a  good  man  and 
brave. 

The  Norman  Conquest  of  England 

William  the  Conqueror  was  a  religious  man  too,  and  he 
made  great  changes  in  the  church  in  England.  The  Arch- 
bishop of  Canterbury,  Stigand,  had  his  church  taken  away  from 
him,  and  a  holy  monk  named  Lanfranc  from  the  Abbey  of 


Harold  takes  the  oath  to  Duke  William  of  Normandy,  and  thereafter  returns  to  England. 


Harold  is  offered  the  crown  on  the  death  of  King  Edward,  and  takes  his  seat  upon  the  English  throne. 


At  the  Battle  of  Hastings  against  Duke  William  Harold  receives  an  arrow  in  his  eye, 
and  pulling  it  out,  dies. 

SCENES    IN    THE    LIFE    OF    HAROLD,    THE    LAST    SAXON    KING    OF    ENGLAND. 

From  the  famous  Bayeux  Tapestry  woven  with  pictures  of  the  Conquest  of  England,  made  probably 

by  the  sister  of  William  the  Conqueror. 


THE  GREAT  POPE  HILDEBRAND 


211 


Bee  in  Normandy  was  made  archbishop  instead.  He  was 
very  strict,  and  made  all  the  priests  in  England  live  better  and 
stricter  lives.  A  great  many  Norman  priests  and  monks 
came  to  England  too,  and  did  great  good  for  the  people. 
But  there  were  other  changes 
which  made  the  English  people 
very  unhappy.  Nearly  all  the 
great  English  nobles  were  killed, 
and  their  lands  were  given  to 
William's  Norman  friends. 

For  two  or  three  hundred 
years  all  the  rich  people  in 
England  were  Normans  and 
spoke  French.  A  great  many 
French  words  changed  a  little 
were  added  to  the  English  lan- 
guage. The  Normans  had  much 
finer  manners  than  the  English, 
whom  they  looked  down  on. 
But  after  a  time  the  Normans 
began  to  mix  with  the  English 
and  learned  their  language,  and 
in  the  end  the  Norman  settlers 
and  the  English  they  had  con- 
quered became  one  people. 

The     Normans     were     much   norman  and  early  English  arches 

more  civilized  than  the  English,  contrasted 

and    thev   tauffht    the   English  ^^°^^  ^""^  ''^"^'^  ^"""^^^  ^""^"^  *^«  '^*^®  °^ 

y  ri^i  Durham  Cathedral,  while  the  pointed  arches 

many  thmgS.        They  were  great    below,  from  thechoirof  canterbury  cathedral, 

builders  and  built  beautiful  stone  '^"^  '^'  ^'t  ^^-fp^^^'^^om  Norman  to 

Early  English  style. 

churches  all  over  England,  some 

of  which  remain  to  this  day,  for  they  were  very  strong  as 
well  as  beautiful.  One  way  of  telling  a  Norman  church  from 
those  built  in  the  later  Middle  Ages  is  that  the  arches  of 
the  Norman  churches  were  round  and  later  they  were  pointed. 
Great  feudal  castles,  too,  were  built  all  over  England,  but 


212  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

William  the  Conqueror  was  one  of  the  first  kings  in  any- 
country  to  keep  the  feudal  lords  in  order.  They  dared  not 
rebel  against  him,  as  the  feudal  lords  in  France  and  Germany 
were  always  rebelling  against  their  kings.  Nor  would  he  let 
them  fight  among  themselves  and  disturb  the  people. 

William  tried  to  rule  the  English  people  well,  but  he 
could  be  very  cruel.  When  the  Enghsh  in  the  North  of 
England  rebelled  against  him  he  marched  against  them,  and 
killed  all  the  people,  and  burned  every  house  and  destroyed 
every  Hving  thing,  so  that  for  years  the  whole  county  of 
Yorkshire  was  as  bare  as  a  desert. 

William  the  Conqueror  when  he  came  to  England  brought 
with  him  a  banner  sent  to  him  with  his  blessing  by  the  great 
Pope  Gregory  vii.,  who  is  generally  called  Hildebrand,  and 
was  one  of  the  best  and  greatest  of  all  the  Popes.  Since  the 
days  of  the  Emperor  Otto  there  had  been  several  popes. 
Sometimes  the  emperors  had  chosen  them  and  sometimes 
they  had  not  taken  any  notice  of  them.  But  when  Hildebrand 
became  Pope  in  1073  the  Emperor  Henry  iii.  had  got  much 
power  over  the  popes. 

Hildebrand,  who  was  a  monk,  was  very  anxious  to  make 
the  Church  better,  but  he  did  not  think  it  was  right  that 
even  a  good  emperor  should  be  more  powerful  than  the  Pope. 
He  thought,  indeed,  that  the  Pope  should  be  the  head  of  all 
Christian  countries,  and  that  kings  and  people  should  do 
what  he  told  them.  This  was  why  he  thought  he  had  the 
right  to  take  the  kingdom  of  England  from  Harold  and 
give  it  to  William  the  Conqueror.  But  when  William 
became  king  of  England,  although  he  was  very  good  and 
helped  the  holy  Lanfranc  to  make  the  Church  better,  he  did 
not  think  he  was  bound  to  obey  the  Pope  in  every  way. 

But  with  the  emperors  who  thought  themselves  greater 
than  the  popes  there  were  struggles  for  many  years.  The 
first  great  struggle  between  an  emperor  and  a  pope  was 
between  Hildebrand  and  the  Emperor  Henry  iv.  Hildebrand 
was  a  little  man  and  rather  fat.     He  stammered  when  he 


POPE 


THE  GREAT  POPE  HILDEBRAND  213 

spoke,  and  he  had  a  rather  dull  face  except  for  his  glittering 
eyes.  He  was  not  a  great  scholar,  but  he  was  a  great  ruler. 
His  one  idea  was  to  make  the  world  better,  and  he  thought 
that  only  the  Pope  as  head  of  the  Church  could  do  this. 

All  over  Europe  the  feudal  lords  were  fighting  one  another, 
and  kings  and  princes  were  often  not  much  better.   Hildebrand 
oiFended   Henry  iv.  when  he  said  that  bishops 
should  not  receive  the  ring  or  crozier  (the  crook 
which  was  always  given  to  a  bishop)  from  princes 
or  nobles,  but  only  from  the  Pope,  or  somebody 
in   his   place.     In  those  days  the  bishops  were 
really  great  nobles  too,  and  received  lands  like 
the  other  great  nobles.     The  kings  thought  that 
it  was  only  right  that  as  the  lands  came  from 
them  so  should  the  ring  and  crozier  to  show  that    hildebrand 
the  bishop  owned  the  king  as  feudal  lord.    So  the 
Emperor  Henry  iv.  was  very  angry  when  Hildebrand  forbade 
this. 

Henry  was  a  young  man,  tall  and  handsome.  He  had 
become  king  of  Germany  when  he  was  only  a  boy  six  years 
old.  His  father  Henry  iii.  had  died  then.  Henry  iii.  was  one 
of  the  greatest  of  the  emperors,  and  in  his  time  the  different 
peoples  who  lived  in  Germany  had  been  kept  well  in  order, 
and  the  people  of  the  North  of  Italy  which  still  belonged  to 
the  emperor  also.  But  while  Henry  iv.  was  a  boy  disorder 
had  come  again.  Henry  belonged  to  the  Swabian  people 
in  South  Germany,  and  the  Saxons  of  North  Germany 
tried  to  break  away  from  his  rule.  Henry  was  still  having 
trouble  with  these  people  when  the  Pope  gave  his  order  about 
'investiture,'  as  the  giving  of  the  ring  and  crozier  to  the 
bishops  was  called. 

Henry  sent  an  angry  letter  to  the  Pope,  saying  that  he 
would  not  obey  him  in  this,  and  telling  him  that  he  was 
'no  Pope  but  a  false  monk.'  Hildebrand  then  declared 
that  Henry  should  no  longer  be  Emperor,  and  so  war  broke 
out    between    the    two.      But    the   Saxons    again    rose   up 


214 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


against  Henry,  and  the  German  nobles  said  that  Henry  must 
give  in  to  the  Pope.  The  Pope  had  excommunicated  Henry. 
too,  which  means  that  he  said  he  could  not  belong  to  the 
Church  until  he  was  forgiven. 

At  last  Henry  saw  that  he  would  have  to  ask  pardon  of 
the  Pope.  He  was  told  that  he  must  remain  quietly  at  a 
place  in  Germany  until  absolution  was  sent  by  the  Pope. 
Meanwhile  he  was  almost  an  outcast  with  no  honours  shown 
to  him  as  a  king,  and  not   even  allowed  to  go  to  church. 

For  many  weeks  he  waited,  and  then 
could  bear  it  no  longer.  He  made  up 
his  mind  to  go  over  the  Alps,  although 
it  was  winter-time  and  very  cold,  and 
beg  pardon  from  the  Pope. 

The  Pope  was  at  Canossa,  and  the 
story  used  to  be  told  that  outside  the 
gate  of  the  castle  there  Henry  had  to 
stand  three  days  with  bare  feet  in  the 
snow  until,  at  last,  the  Pope  forgave 
him.  In  any  case,  we  know  that  Henry 
had  to  beg  hard  for  forgiveness,  and  it 
was  three  days  before  the  Pope  would 
agree.  Even  then  he  still  said  he  had  the 
right  to  take  Henry's  kingdom  from  him, 
and  shortly  afterwards  the  messengers 
whom  the  Pope  had  sent  to  Germany  did  choose  another  king. 
Henry  fought  against  the  new  king,  Rudolph  of  Swabia, 
and  got  the  bishops  of  Germany  and  Italy  who  were  friendly 
to  him  to  elect  a  new  Pope,  who  was  called  Clement  iii.  So 
now  there  were  two  Popes  and  two  emperors.  Then  Henry 
marched  into  Italy  and  into  Rome,  where  Hildebrand  shut 
himself  up  in  the  castle  of  St.  Angelo.  He  sent  for  help  to 
a  great  Norman  prince,  Robert  Guiscard,  who  had  conquered 
the  South  of  Italy,  and  made  it  a  kingdom  for  himself.  The 
Saracens  had  had  to  give  in  to  him,  and  at  last  the  Greek 
Exarch  of  Ravenna  had  to  give  up  that  city. 


AN    EMPEROR   WHO    DEFIED 
THE    POPE 

(From  a  seal  of  Henry  iv., 
Emperor  of  the  Holy  Roman 
Empire  in  the  eleventh  century). 


THE  GREAT  POPE  HILDEBRAND  215 

From  this  time  the  Eastern  Emperor  had  not  had  even 
one  city  in  the  West.  At  the  same  time  that  Robert  Guis- 
card  was  winning  South  Italy  his  younger  brother  Roger 
conquered  Sicily,  and  ruled  it  till  he  died  in  1101.  His  little 
son  Roger  ruled  after  him,  and  when  he  had  grown  to  be  a 
man,  and  his  cousin,  the  son  of  Robert  Guiscard,  died,  Roger 
II.  got  South  Italy  too,  and  joined  them  together  as  one 
kingdom.  Roger  won  more  land  still  in  South  Italy,  and 
among  other  places  he  won  the  beautiful  city  of  Naples. 
Later,  his  kingdom  was  called  the  kingdom  of  Naples  and 
Sicily.  The  Normans  had  always  been  very  friendly  to 
the  Pope,  and  Robert  Guiscard  went  to  Gregory's  help. 

A  Norman  army  marched  to  Rome,  and  instead  of  attack- 
ing Henry  burned  the  city  and  killed  many  of  the  people  and 
then  marched  away  again.  It  was  the  third  time  in  history  that 
the  great  city  had  been  attacked  and  burnt  by  enemies,  but 
the  Normans,  who  were  of  course  Christians,  did  far  more 
harm  than  the  Gauls  so  long  ago  or  the  heathen  Goth  Alaric. 

Hildebrand  followed  the  Normans  to  Salerno,  and  there 
died  soon  afterwards.  As  he  lay  dying,  he  said :  '  I  have  loved 
God  and  hated  iniquity.  Therefore  I  die  in  exile.'  And  it 
was  true.  Hildebrand  only  behaved  as  he  did  to  Henry 
because  he  was  anxious  to  have  good  bishops,  and  so  make 
the  Church  better.  But  he  did  not  understand  that  it  would 
have  been  much  better  to  try  to  do  this  in  some  other  way, 
by  helping  the  Cluniac  monks  and  the  other  new  '  orders '  of 
monks  which  were  growing  up. 

For  good  men  everywhere  were,  like  Hildebrand  himself, 
anxious  for  a  new  time,  when  men  should  be  better,  and  there 
would  be  an  end  of  bloodshed  and  misery,  and  all  priests  and 
peoples  and  kings,  and  nobles  too,  should  join  together  to  lead 
good  and  peaceful  lives.  Hildebrand  did  not  understand  that 
the  kings  and  princes  of  Europe  would  never  agree  to  hold 
their  kingdoms  from  him.  He  made  a  great  mistake,  but  all 
the  same  he  was  a  very  good  and  noble  man,  and  one  of  the 
greatest  of  the  popes. 


216  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

The  popes  who  came  after  Hildebrand  were  good  men  too, 
and  the  work  he  had  begun  went  on.  They  were  not  so 
fierce  as  Hildebrand,  yet  Henry  iv,  was  never  forgiven.  His 
eldest  son  Conrad  was  encouraged  to  rebel  against  him,  and 
when  Conrad  died  his  other  son  Henry  did  the  same.  He 
raised  the  Saxons  in  rebellion  against  his  father,  and  was 
called  king  by  the  Pope. 

Henry  was  growing  old  and  tired.  His  life  had  been  one 
long  struggle.  In  his  younger  days  he  had  not  lived  a  very 
good  life,  but  he  had  grown  better  as  he  grew  older.  His 
sons  and  many  other  people  thought  that  it  was  not  wrong  to 
rebel  against  him  because  he  was  excommunicated,  and 
therefore  an  outcast.  Henry  had  struggled  against  his  elder 
son,  but  when  the  younger  turned  against  him  he  threw  him- 
self at  his  feet  and  begged  that  at  any  rate  his  sins  should 
not  be  punished  by  his  own  child.  He  tried  hard  to  get  the 
Pope's  forgiveness,  but  would  not  give  up  his  kingdom. 

And  so  at  last  he  died,  and  was  buried  with  his 
ancestors  in  the  beautiful  church  at  Liege,  which  he  himself 
had  built ;  but  the  bishop  of  Speyer  ordered  that  his  body 
should  be  taken  up  again,  and  for  five  years  it  was  kept  in  a 
chapel  at  Speyer,  and  then  at  last  buried  in  the  cathedral 
there.  But  before  Henry's  death  great  things  had  been 
happening  in  Europe,  which  showed,  even  more  than  his  sad 
life  did,  the  great  power  of  the  popes. 


CHAPTER   XXII 

THE  CRUSADES 

It  was  in  the  days  of  Pope  Paschal  that  the  Emperor 
Henry  iv.  died,  but  before  him  there  had  been  the  great 
Pope  Urban  ii.,  and  under  him  began  the  most  wonderful 
thing  that  happened  during  the  Middle  Ages.  This  was  the 
beginning  of  the  crusades,  when  knights  and  soldiers  from  all 
the  countries  of  Western  Europe  joined  together  and  went  to 
the  East  to  fight  the  Mohammedans,  and  win  back  from  them 
the  Holy  Sepulchre  or  Tomb  of  Our  Lord,  which  they  had 
taken. 

At  first  all  the  countries  conquered  by  the  Arabs  had 
been  governed  by  one  ruler,  but  afterwards  there  had 
been  two  Kaliphs,  one  in  the  East  at  Bagdad,  the  beautiful 
city  on  the  Tigris  which  the  Eastern  Kaliph  made  his 
capital,  and  one  in  the  West.  Then  after  many  years  the 
Kaliphs  began  to  lose  power,  and  many  Mohammedan  kings 
made  little  kingdoms  of  their  own,  and  forgot  to  obey  the 
Kaliphs  any  more.  Soon  after  the  year  1000  some  Turks 
from  the  middle  of  Asia  poured  in  great  numbers  into  the 
lands  of  the  Mohammedans  in  Asia,  and  soon  conquered  them. 

These  Seljuk  Turks,  as  they  were  called  (because  they  told 
tales  of  a  great  heroic  leader  they  once  had  whose  name  was 
Seljuk),  were  a  very  fierce  people  related  to  the  terrible  Huns 
who  had  tried  to  destroy  Europe  in  the  days  of  Attila.  The 
Turks  became  Mohammedans,  but  were  much  fiercer  than  the 
Arabs  had  ever  been.  They  conquered  Palestine  and  Syria, 
and  this  was  how  they  took  the  Holy  Sepulchre  from  the 
Christians.      Before    this    Jerusalem    had    belonged    to    the 


218  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

Mohammedans  of  Egypt,  who  had  allowed  the  Christians 
to  go  to  pray  at  the  Holy  Sepulchre. 

In  the  Middle  Ages  people  very  often  made  long  journeys 
or  pilgrimages  to  pray  at  the  graves  of  saints  and  martyrs, 
and  pilgrims  went  in  great  numbers  especially  to  the  Holy 
Sepulchre  of  Christ  at  Jerusalem.  But  the  fierce  Seljuk 
Turks  were  very  cruel  to  the  pilgrims,  and  very  disrespectful 
to  the  Holy  Sepulchre.  When  the  people  in  the  West  of 
Europe  heard  of  these  things  they  were  very  angry,  and  it  was 
this  which  brought  about  the  crusades. 

The  first  crusade  was  in  the  year  1096,  and  for  two  hundred 
years  after  this,  from  time  to  time  new  crusades  were 
preached  and  fought.  The  great  preacher  of  the  first  crusade 
was  a  Frenchman  called  Peter  the  Hermit.  He  was  a  priest 
who  lived  a  very  strict  life,  and  about  the  year  1093  he  made 
a  pilgrimage  to  Jerusalem,  and  there  saw  how  badly  the 
Christian  pilgrims  were  treated  by  the  Turks.  He  came 
back  to  Europe  and  told  Pope  Urban  ii.  all  about  it,  and 
asked  his  permission  to  preach  to  the  people,  and  get  the 
soldiers  of  Europe  to  go  and  save  the  Sepulchre  from  the 
Turks. 

The  Pope  gave  him  permission,  and  Peter  travelled  all 
over  Italy  and  France  telling  the  people  the  things  he  had 
seen.  He  was  a  little  man  with  a  thin  pale  face,  but  bright 
eager  eyes.  He  wore  only  a  shirt,  and  a  pilgrim's  cloak,  and 
he  rode  on  a  donkey,  holding  in  his  hand  a  cross.  People 
gave  him  money  and  presents,  but  he  gave  it  all  to  the  poor 
again,  and  ate  just  enough  to  keep  himself  alive.  The  people 
grew  very  excited  when  he  talked  to  them,  and  every  man 
who  made  up  his  mind  to  go  to  the  East  to  fight  the  Turks 
wore  a  badge  in  the  shape  of  a  red  cross  on  the  right 
shoulder,  and  he  was  called  a  crusader,  or  a  soldier  of  the 
cross. 

The  Pope  himself  went  to  a  place  in  France  called 
Clermont,  and  there  he  called  a  great  meeting,  called  a 
council,  of   bishops   and    princes    and   nobles,  to   whom   he 


THE  CRUSADES 


219 


talked  about  the  crusade.     He  spoke  to  a  great  crowd  of  the 

poorer  people  too,  asking  all  who  could  to  join  the  crusade. 

The  people  shouted  as  he  finished  his  speech,  '  It  is  the  will  of 

God.'     Great  nobles 

and  captains  offered 

themselves    for    the 

crusade,      and      the 

soldiers  chose  which 

leader    they    would 

follow. 

But  before  the 
real  crusaders  were 
ready  to  start,  an 
impatient  crowd  set 
off  to  the  Holy  Land 
under  Peter  the 
Hermit,  and  a  cap- 
tain called  Walter 
the  Penniless.  They 
had  no  order,  and  they  did  much  harm  and  destruction  in  the 
countries  they  passed  through.  They  never  reached  even 
Constantinople,  but  were  killed  by  fierce  tribes  in  the  East 
of  Europe.     Only  Peter  the  Hermit  lived  to  tell  the  tale. 

Meanwhile,  on  the  15th  August  1096,  the  army  of  the 

First   Crusade  set  out  for   the 

* 

East.  Among  the  great  nobles 
who  led  their  soldiers  on  this 
crusade  was  Robert,  duke  of 
Normandy,  the  eldest  son  of 
William  the  Conqueror.  The 
Conqueror  was  now  dead,  but 
Robert  had  not  been  made  king 
of  England.  He  was  duke  of 
Normandy,  and  William  the  Red  was  king  of  England.  But 
Robert  was  a  soldier  more  than  anything  else,  and  had  practi- 
cally sold  Normandy  to  William,  to  get  money  for  the  crusade. 


CRUSADERS    AND    PEOPLE    ON    THE    MARCH    TO    THE 
HOLY    CITY 

(From  a  drawing  in  an  ancient  MS.  at  Venice). 


KNIGHTS    OF    THE    FIRST    CRUPADE 

(From  a  twelfth-century  MS.). 


220  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

Many  of  the  princes  and  nobles  were  good  and  religious 
men,  but  many,  too,  went  on  crusade  because  they  loved 
fighting  and  adventures.  These  were  Norman  nobles  from 
the  South  of  Italy,  and  French  nobles  like  Raimond  of  Tou- 
louse, and  Godfrey  de  Bouillon,  duke  of  Lower  Lorraine. 

Godfrey  de  Bouillon  the  Hero  of  the  Crusades 

Godfrey  was  the  real  hero  of  the  crusade.  The  crusaders 
marched  through  Germany  and  Hungary  to  the  gates  of 
Constantinople,  where  the  Eastern  Emperor  wanted  them  to 
help  him  to  win  back  some  of  his  land,  which  the  Turks  had 
taken  from  him.  But  the  crusaders  were  thinking  of  quite 
other  things.  For  nine  months  they  besieged  the  city  of 
Antioch,  but  took  it  at  last.  Then  they  marched  on  to 
Jerusalem,  and  as  they  came  in  sight  of  the  Holy  City  which 
they  had  come  to  win,  the  crusaders  fell  on  their  knees. 
Then  they  took  off  their  armour,  and  walked  with  bare  feet 
like  pilgrims  to  the  city.  But  it  was  a  month  before  they 
could  break  their  way  in,  and  then  the  crusaders  showed  no 
mercy. 

They  were  cruel  enough  in  their  wars  with  each  other  at 
home,  but  with  the  enemies  of  Christ  they  were  more  cruel 
still.  The  Mohammedans  were  cut  down  and  killed  in  the 
streets,  and  the  horses  of  the  crusaders  were  up  to  their  knees 
in  blood  as  they  went  to  the  Holy  Sepulchre.  There  the 
leaders  prayed,  with  heads  and  feet  bare,  and  Godfrey  dressed 
in  a  robe  of  white  linen. 

The  nobles  had  now  to  choose  a  king  to  rule  over  Pales- 
tine with  his  capital  at  Jerusalem.  Robert  of  Normandy  was 
chosen  first,  but  he  loved  better  to  fight  than  to  rule,  and 
so  refused.  So  Godfrey  was  chosen  and  agreed  to  do  the 
work  of  a  king,  but  he  would  not  wear  a  crown,  he  said,  '  in  a 
city  where  his  King  had  been  crowned  with  thorns.'  Then 
most  of  the  knights  and  soldiers  went  home  again,  while 
Godfrey  stayed  to  rule  his  kingdom,  and  so  ended  the  First 
Crusade. 


THE  CRUSADES 


221 


Godfrey  de  Bouillon  died  before  a  year  was  past,  and  his 
brother  Baldwin  became  king  of  Jerusalem  in  his  place. 
Godfrey  and  his  friend  Tancred  were  the  greatest  and  best  of 
the  knights  who  fought  in  the  Holy  War.  Many  of  the 
others  were  not  good  men,  but  the  lives  of  men  like  Godfrey 
show  us  the  better  side  of  the  times.  Not  very  many  knights 
remained  in  the  East  after  the  First  Crusade,  but  new  ones 
were  always  going  out.  Baldwin  ruled  Jerusalem  for  eighteen 
years,  and  after  him  his  nephew,  another  Baldwin. 

All  this  time  there  was  fighting  with  the  Mohammedans, 
but  the  kingdom  of  Jerusalem  was  well  and  strongly  governed. 
But  after  the  death  of  Baldwin 
II.,  when  the  counts  of  Anjou 
got  the  crown,  things  were 
different.  One  of  these  kings 
was  a  leper,  and  others  were 
only  children,  and  the  feudal 
lords,  among  whom  the  land 
had  been  divided,  became  very 
disorderly. 

Many   of  these  lords   had 
married  women  of  the  East,  and 

lived  in  luxury  which  they  learned  from  the  Eastern  peoples. 
Their  children  and  their  children's  children  forgot  the  ways 
of  the  West,  and  were  very  different  from  Godfrey  and 
Tancred  and  the  knights  of  the  First  Crusade.  In  fact, 
the  defence  of  the  Holy  Sepulchre  and  the  fighting  against 
the  Mohammedans  was  now  chiefly  done  by  some  knights 
who  really  became  monks.  That  is  to  say,  they  lived  the 
lives  of  monks  during  times  of  peace,  not  marrying,  but  living 
together  in  a  monastery  and  spending  most  of  their  time  in 
prayer,  while  in  time  of  war  they  lived  as  soldiers. 

There  were  two  '  orders '  of  these  knights  at  Jerusalem. 
The  knights  of  one  order  were  called  the  Templars  because 
they  made  their  first  monastery  near  the  place  where  the  great 
temple  of  Solomon  had  once  been.     The  other  was  the  Order 


KING    BALDWIN    OF   JERUSALEM    WITH 
HIS    KNIGHTS 

(From  a  drawing  in  an  ancient  MS. ). 


222  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

of  St.  John,  or  the  Hospitallers,  who  were  so  called  because 
they  set  up  a  hotel  or  hospital  where  poor  pilgrims  to  the 
Holy  Sepulchre  could  eat  and  sleep. 

In  the  year  1145,  the  Turks  attacked  the  city  of  Edessa, 
in  the  North-East  of  the  kingdom  of  Jerusalem.  Edessa  was 
ruled  by  one  of  those  feudal  knights  who  had  given  them- 
selves up  to  pleasure,  and  he  did  not  even  try  to  save  the 
town.  But  when  the  news  came  to  Western  Europe  the 
Christians  were  very  indignant,  and  so  the  Second  Crusade 
was  made  ready.  The  man  who  did  most  to  persuade 
princes  and  people  to  join  this  crusade  was  the  great  monk 
St.  Bernard,  who  was  the  most  important  man  of  his  time. 
The  two  chief  leaders  in  the  Second  Crusade,  which  started 
for  the  East  in  1146,  were  the  Emperor  Conrad  and  the 
French  King  Louis  vii.  But  the  Second  Crusade  was  quite 
a  failure,  and  Louis  and  Conrad  soon  came  home  again. 

The  kingdom  of  Jerusalem  grew  weaker  and  weaker, 
while  the  Turks  grew  stronger.  At  last  there  arose  a 
great  hero  among  the  Turks  called  Saladin.  In  some 
ways,  although  he  was  a  fierce  Mohammedan  and  hated 
Christianity,  Saladin  was  very  like  the  best  of  the  Christian 
knights.  He  was  very  fond  of  children  and  gentle  to  women. 
Though  he  was  fierce  in  fighting,  he  was  not  cruel  to  his 
prisoners.  His  soldiers  loved  him  and  would  do  anything  for 
him.  The  people  of  Western  Europe  were  shocked  to  hear, 
in  the  year  1088,  that  Saladin  had  conquered  the  Christian 
kingdom  and  taken  Jerusalem  itself.  It  was  this  news  which 
brought  about  the  Third  Crusade. 

King  Richard  of  the  Lion  Heart 

The  Third  Crusade  was  almost  as  great  as  the  First,  though 
it  did  not  win  much  in  the  end.  The  Emperor  Frederick 
Barbarossa,  or  Frederick  with  the  Red  Beard,  who  was  one 
of  the  greatest  of  the  emperors,  joined  it.  So  did  Philip 
Augustus,  one  of  the  greatest  of  the  French  kings,  who  had 
by  this  time  become  strong  rulers,  able  to  keep  the  French 


THE  CRUSADES 


•223 


feudal  lords  in  order.  The  great  hero  of  the  crusade,  on  the 
Christian  side,  was  the  king  of  England,  Richard  Cceur  de 
Lion,  or  Richard  of  the  Lion  Heart  as  he  was  called,  because 
he  was  so  brave.  ]Many  dukes  and  nobles  joined  the  crusade 
too. 

Frederick  Barbarossa  had  been  crowned  emperor  when  he 
was  about  thirty  years  old  by  Pope  Adrian  iv,.  the  onlv 
Englishman  who  was  ever  a  Pope. 
Adrian's  name,  before  he  became  Pope, 
was  Nicholas  Breakspear.  He  had 
been  a  poor  student  at  one  time. 
Frederick  was  one  of  those  emperors 
who  thought  that  the  Emperor  should 
be  above  the  Pope,  and  he  nearly 
quarrelled  with  Adrian  by  saying  that 
he  would  not  hold  the  Pope's  stirrup 
to  help  him  to  get  otf  his  horse,  but  in 
the  end  he  did  it. 

But  later  on  the  Pope  and 
the  Emperor  had  many  quarrels. 
A  great  many  important  towns 
had  grown  up  in  the  Xorth  of 
Italy,  and  some  of  these,  especi- 
ally JNIilan.  did  not  want  to  be 
under  the  Emperor,  who  still 
kept  the  North  of  Italy  as  well 
as  Germany.  But  Frederick 
took  a  great  ai'my  into  Italy  and  practically  destroyed  JMilan. 
He  quarrelled,  too.  with  the  new  Pope,  Alexander  iii..  and 
soon  after  his  friends  tried  to  set  up  another  Pope,  who  was 
called  the  anti-pope.  Once  during  the  quarrel  he  marched 
to  Rome,  had  the  anti-pope  set  up  in  the  palace  of  the  popes, 
and  got  him  to  crown  his  wife  Beatrix. 

After  many  years  the  other  cities  joined  together  into  a 
league  called  the  Lombard  League,  and  helped  to  build  up 
^lilan  again.     When  the  Emperor  came  again  on  one  of  his 


PHILIP    AUGtSTlS,    KING    OF    FRANCF 
FROM    11  SO    TO    li^^S 

\From  a  statue,  perhaps  carved  dxiring  his 
life-time,  in  a  church  toundeil  by  the  king). 


224  THE  STOKY  OF  THE  WORLD 

many  visits  from  Germany  to  fight  them  there  was  a  great 
battle.  The  men  of  Milan  fought  round  a  sacred  car  on 
which  was  a  figure  of  Christ.  The  best  soldiers  had  been 
picked  out  to  defend  the  car,  and  they  were  called  the 
Company  of  Death.  This  time  the  towns  won,  and  the 
Emperor  had  to  give  them  a  great  deal  of  freedom,  though 
he  still  kept  a  sort  of  power  over  them. 

Frederick  then  gave  in  to  the  Pope  and  was  received  again 
into  the  Church,  for  he  had  of  course  been  excommunicated. 
In  the  great  piazza  or  square  in  Venice  he  knelt  at  Pope 
Alexander's  feet,  and  the  Pope  raised  him  up  and  gave  him  the 
kiss  of  peace.  It  was  just  one  hundred  years  since  Henry  iv. 
had  asked  forgiveness  at  Canossa.    So  again  the  Pope  had  won. 

Frederick,  then,  had  had  a  stormy  life,  and  was  an  old  man 
when  he  joined  the  Third  Crusade.  He  led  his  great  army  by 
land  while  Philip  and  Richard  took  theirs  by  sea,  but  as  the 
German  army  reached  a  stream  just  before  crossing  into  Syria, 
the  brave  old  Emperor  was  drowned.  The  river  was  flowing 
very  quickly,  but  the  Emperor  spurred  his  horse  into  it,  and 
was  carried  away  and  drowned.  The  people  of  Germany 
were  full  of  sorrow,  for  he  had  ruled  them  well  and  they  had 
loved  him. 

He  was  a  very  handsome  man,  with  long  yellow  hair 
curling  over  his  ears  and  with  a  long  red  beard,  from  which 
the  Italians  called  him  Barbarossa.  He  had  a  clear  white 
skin  and  bright  eyes  and  a  merry  smile.  Long  afterwards 
the  German  people  looked  back  on  his  reign  as  a  time  of 
great  peace  and  joy.  They  said,  indeed,  that  he  did  not  die, 
but  was  only  sleeping,  and  would  come  one  day  to  rule  them 
again. 

The  other  leaders  stopped  before  the  town  of  Acre,  and 
besieged  it  for  two  years.  There  was  fierce  fighting,  and 
Richard  of  the  Lion  Heart,  who  had  come  late,  showed  his 
great  courage  when,  although  he  was  ill,  he  had  himself 
carried  among  the  soldiers,  so  that  he  could  give  them  orders 
in  the  fight.     The  Black  Standard  of  Saladin  waved  proudly 


THE  CRUSADES  225 

above  the  city,  though  Saladin  was  not  there  at  the  time. 
With  Richard's  help  Acre  was  soon  taken,  and  the  crusaders 
were  now  free  to  march  to  Jerusalem.  But  Philip  Augustus 
was  anxious  to  get  home  again  and  give  himself  up  to  the 


CRUSADERS    AND    SARACENS    IN    BATTLE 

(From  a  stained-glass  window  made  early  in  the  twelfth  century). 

work    of   making    France    stronger.     Most   of   the    French 
soldiers  went  home  with  their  king. 

Richard  led  the  rest  of  the  crusaders  after  this,  and  won 
many  battles  against  Saladin,  but  he  could  not  win  Jerusalem, 
and  at  last  he  made  peace  with  Saladin.  The  Christians  had 
lost  the  kingdom  which  they  had  won  in  the  First  Crusade, 

p 


226  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

but  were  allowed  to  keep  a  little  land  on  the  coast  round 
Jaffa,  and  pilgrims  in  small  numbers  were  to  be  allowed  to 
visit  the  Holy  Sepulchre.  Before  he  turned  homewards 
Richard  was  taken  to  the  top  of  a  hill,  from  which  he  could 
see  the  white  buildings  of  Jerusalem  glistening  far  off  in  the 
sunshine.  But  Richard  put  his  shield  before  his  face.  He 
could  not  bear  to  look  at  the  Holy  City,  which  he  had  hoped 
to  win  again  for  the  Christians. 

For  a  hundred  years  after  this  there  were  other  crusades, 
though  not  so  great  as  the  First  and  Third.  But  Jerusalem 
was  never  really  won  back,  and  is  in  the  hands  of  the  Moham- 
medans still.  Richard  started  for  home,  but  it  was  a  long 
time  before  he  reached  England,  for  he  had  many  adventures 
on  the  way.     Saladin  died  the  next  year. 

One  reason  why  the  Third  Crusade  was  not  a  great  success 
was  that  the  leaders  were  jealous  of  each  other.  Although 
Richard  was  so  brave  and  splendid  a  knight,  he  was  not  easy 
to  get  on  with,  for  he  wanted  to  have  things  all  his  own  way. 
One  of  the  leaders  who  had  quarrelled  very  bitterly  with 
Richard  was  Leopold,  duke  of  Austria.  Richard  had  to  pass 
through  Leopold's  country  on  his  way  home.  He  dressed 
himself  up  as  a  pilgrim,  but  some  one  found  out  who  he  was, 
and  he  was  put  in  prison  by  the  duke. 

After  a  time  Richard  was  given  over  to  the  new  emperor, 
Henry  vi.,  the  son  of  Frederick  Barbarossa.  The  Emperor 
kept  him  in  prison  for  two  years.  A  story  is  told  that  no 
one  in  England  really  knew  what  had  happened  to  Richard 
until  his  minstrel  Blondel  found  out  where  he  was.  A 
story  is  told  of  how  Blondel  travelled  from  castle  to  castle 
all  over  Germany,  and  at  last,  as  he  rested  outside  the  castle 
where  Richard  was  shut  up,  he  heard  his  master's  voice 
singing  an  old  French  song.  Blondel,  in  great  excitement, 
sang  a  verse  of  the  song,  hoping  that  Richard  would  hear 
him,  and  he  did.  Richard  was  glad,  for  he  knew  that  Blondel 
would  go  back  to  England  and  tell  the  English  people  of  the 
troubles  of  their  king.     And  so  he  did. 


A    SARACEN    ARMY    ON    THE    MARCH    AGAINST    THE    CRUSADERS. 
(From  an  ancient  Arabiein  MS.  in  the  National  Library  at  Paris.) 


THE  CRUSADES  227 

Richard's  wicked  brother  John  was  looking  after  England 
and  did  not  want  the  king  to  come  back,  but  in  the  end  he  had 
to  pay  the  ransom  of  a  great  sum  of  money  which  the  Emperor 
asked  for,  and  Richard  was  at  last  set  free.  He  did  not  live 
long  after  he  got  back  to  England.  For  years  after  his  time  the 
Mohammedans  told  tales  of  his  great  courage  and  strength, 
and  in  Syria  if  an  Arab's  horse  jumped  or  seemed  frightened 
the  Arab  would  say  to  it,  '  Why !  do  you  think  it  is  King 
Richard  ? ' 

At  the  same  time  that  the  Christians  and  Mohammedans 
were  struggling  in  the  East,  a  great  struggle  was  going  on 
too  between  the  Christians  and  the  Moors  in  Spain.  We 
have  seen  that  Spain  was  the  only  country  in  Western 
Europe,  except  the  South  of  Italy,  which  was  won  by  the 
Mohammedans.  The  Normans  had  conquered  South  Italy 
again,  but  for  hundreds  of  years  nearly  all  Spain  belonged 
to  the  Moors.  Charles  the  Great  had,  however,  driven  them 
as  far  South  as  the  Ebro,  and  little  Christian  kingdoms  had 
grown  up  there. 

In  time  these  began  to  grow  stronger,  and  by  degrees  to 
push  the  Moors  farther  and  farther  South,  so  that  by  the 
end  of  the  thirteenth  century  they  only  had  a  little  strip  of 
land  in  the  South,  and  nearly  all  Spain  was  Christian  again. 
The  great  hero  in  this  struggle  between  the  Moors  and 
Christians  in  Spain  was  a  man  named  Ruy  Diaz,  but  who  has 
always  been  called  by  the  Spaniards  the  '  Cid,'  which  means 
the  '  Lord. '  He  was  born  not  many  years  after  the  year 
1000,  and  spent  his  whole  life  in  fighting. 

The  people  of  Spain  tell  that  he  always  fought  for  the 
Christians,  but  other  people  have  said  that  he  sometimes 
fought  for  the  Moors.  At  any  rate  he  won  many  marvellous 
victories  over  the  Moors,  and  he  died  still  fighting  them, 
when  he  was  an  old  man,  about  the  time  of  the  First  Crusade. 

The  Spaniards  tell  that  their  hero  was  kind  and  gentle 
as  well  as  brave.  Once,  they  say,  as  he  was  returning  after 
a  victory,  which  he  had  won  over  five  Moorish  kings,  he  saw 


228  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

a  poor  man  suffering  from  the  dreadful  disease  of  leprosy, 
which  so  many  people  had  in  the  Middle  Ages.  The  leper 
was  lying  on  the  road  begging  for  pity,  but  the  Spanish 
knights  passed  him  by,  all  except  the  Cid,  who  lifted  him  up 
and  took  him  home  on  his  horse,  fed  him  and  put  him  to 
sleep  in  his  own  bed.  In  the  night  the  Cid  awoke  and  the 
leper  was  no  longer  there,  but  a  beautiful  figure  stood  beside 
him  and  spoke  to  him,  telling  him  that  he  was  St.  Lazarus 
and  had  only  appeared  to  him  as  a  leper,  and  he  promised  him 
that  he  should  win  in  his  battles  against  the  Moors. 

The  Spaniards  told,  too,  how  when  the  Cid  lay  dying  he 
heard  that  a  great  Moorish  army  from  North  Africa  was 
coming  to  Spain.  He  told  his  soldiers  that  when  he  died 
they  must  not  cry  out  or  moan,  so  that  the  enemy  would 
know  what  had  happened,  but  they  must  dress  him  in  his 
armour,  put  a  sword  in  his  hand  and  tie  him  sitting  on  his 
horse,  and  he  would  once  more  lead  them  to  victory  though 
he  was  dead.  And  so  he  did.  His  soldiers  fought  around 
their  dead  leader,  and  the  Moors  were  defeated  in  a  great 
battle.  And  after  this  the  Christians  went  on  conquering 
until  the  Moors  were  driven  out  of  Spain. 


CHAPTER   XXIII 

THE  MONKS  AND  THE  PEOPLE  IN  THE  TIME  OF  THE 

CRUSADES 

In  the  early  days  of  the  crusades,  when  the  soldiers  of  the 
Cross  were  fighting  in  the  East,  many  interesting  things 
were  happening  among  the  people  left  at  home. 

We  have  seen  that  in  all  the  countries  of  Western  Europe 
there  were  people  who  were  anxious  to  live  better  lives. 
New  monasteries  and  convents  were  built  where  men  and 
women  who  wanted  to  pray  and  live  in  peace  could  go. 
Especially  in  France  this  happened,  partly  perhaps  because 
the  feudal  lords  were  so  powerful  in  France,  while  the  king 
had  not  yet  got  much  power.  Great  new  '  orders  '  of  monks 
rose  up,  for  sometimes  a  monk  seeing  the  faults  in  the  older 
monasteries  would  set  up  a  new  monastery  with  new  rules  by 
which  to  keep  from  these  faults. 

One  of  the  greatest  of  these  new  orders  was  one  founded 
by  St.  Bruno.  At  first  Bruno  was  head  of  the  school  belong- 
ing to  the  cathedral  at  the  French  town  called  Rheims.  In 
those  days  there  were  no  schools  except  those  belonging  to 
cathedrals  and  monasteries,  and  as  a  rule  only  boys  who  were 
going  to  be  priests  or  monks  were  taught  to  read  and 
write.  Bruno  was  very  good  and  pious,  and  when  the  new 
archbishop  of  Rheims,  who  was  named  Manasses,  did  wrong 
things  Bruno  scolded  him.  But  the  archbishop  was  very 
angry,  and  Bruno  had  to  go  away  from  Rheims  and  hide  for  a 
long  time. 

Then  when  Manasses  died  the  priests  at  the  cathedral 
chose   Bruno  to  be  their  archbishop,  but  the   French  king, 

220 


230  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

Philip  I.,  would  not  agree  to  this.  Rheims  was  in  that  part 
of  France  where  the  French  king  had  real  power.  Philip 
was  a  very  wicked  king,  and  Pope  Hildebrand  had  told 
him  so  plainly,  while  later  Pope  Urban  excommunicated 
him  because  he  sent  away  his  queen.  Bertha,  after  he  had 
been  married  to  her  for  twenty  years,  and  took  another  wife. 

Naturally,  Philip  did  not  want  an  archbishop  who  was  a 
saint  like  Bruno.  However,  Bruno  did  not  mind  at  all,  but 
went  into  a  wild  part  of  the  country  near  a  town  called 
Grenoble  and  built  there  a  new  monastery.  He  made  quite 
a  new  rule  for  his  monks.  Instead  of  doing  everything 
together,  like  the  earlier  monks  eating  in  a  large  room  called 
the  refectory,  and  sleeping  in  another  large  room  called  the 
dormitory,  St.  Bruno  and  his  monks  had  each  a  little  house 
of  his  own.  Each  monk  lived  and  ate  and  slept  in  his  own 
house,  and  only  went  with  the  other  monks  at  those  times 
when  they  prayed  in  the  church.  The  monks  never  spoke, 
and  lived  the  very  strictest  of  lives. 

The  monastery  which  St.  Bruno  built  near  Grenoble 
was  called  the  Grand  Chartreuse.  Afterwards,  he  went  to 
Calabria  in  Italy,  and  built  two  more  charterhouses,  as 
monasteries  of  this  order  were  called.  The  order  was  called 
the  Carthusian  order,  and  it  soon  spread  over  the  countries 
of  Western  Europe.  It  never  became  less  strict  like  many 
other  orders.  There  is  a  Carthusian  monastery  in  the 
South  of  England  even  now,  where  the  monks  live  exactly 
the  same  kind  of  life  that  St.  Bruno  and  his  monks  lived 
nine  hundred  years  ago. 

T'^.ere  were  '  lay  brothers '  also  in  the  order  who  did  not 
spend  so  much  time  in  saying  prayers,  but  did  the  work  of 
the  monastery  and  grew  things  on  the  land.  The  monks  of 
the  Grand  Chartreuse  found  out  how  to  make  a  certain  kind 
of  wine  which  is  called  '  Chartreuse,'  and  nobody  else  has  ever 
found  out  exactly  how  it  is  made. 

There  was  another  great  order  of  monks  which  was  begun 
about  the  same  time  as  the  Carthusians.     This  was  the  great 


MONKS  AND  PEOPLE  DURING  CRUSADES     231 

'  Cistercian  '  order,  which  also  began  in  France.  A  holy  monk 
named  Robert  set  up  a  Benedictine  monastery  at  Moleme  in 
the  North  of  Burgundy.  He  tried  to  make  his  monks  keep 
the  Rule  of  St.  Benedict  properly,  but  they  thought  he  was 
too  strict  and  would  not.  So  very  sadly  Robert  left  them 
with  just  a  few  of  the  monks  and  went  to  a  lonely  place 
called  Citeaux  in  the  South  of  France.  He  began  another 
monastery  there. 

The  Great  St.  Bernard 

At  first  there  were  only  Robert  and  his  few  friends. 
One  of  these  was  named  Stephen  Harding,  and  was  an 
Englishman.  Afterwards  he  was  made  a  saint.  Soon  people 
began  to  hear  about  the  splendid  lives  which  the  monks  of 
Citeaux  lived,  and  one  day  there  came  to  the  monastery 
a  young  French  nobleman  named  Bernard.  He  had  with 
him  thirty  of  his  relations,  and  he  begged  that  they  might  all 
become  monks.  This  Bernard  was  the  great  St.  Bernard 
who  became  the  most  important  man  of  his  time. 

So  many  men  came  to  be  monks  at  Citeaux  that  the 
monastery  would  not  hold  them,  and  so  little  bands  of  monks 
were  always  going  away  to  set  up  new  monasteries  in  other 
places.  St.  Bernard  himself  did  this,  and  became  head  of  a 
monastery  at  Clairvaux.  He  is  often  called  St.  Bernard  of 
Clairvaux.  But  all  the  monasteries  of  the  Cistercian  order 
were  under  the  abbot  of  Citeaux,  and  he  in  his  turn  had 
to  take  the  advice  of  the  abbots  of  the  four  other  chief 
monasteries  of  the  order.    One  of  these  was  Clairvaux. 

The  Cistercian  monks  gave  up  the  black  robe  of  the  Bene- 
dictines and  wore  white  habits.  They  are  often  called  the 
'  White  Monks,'  though  the  Carthusians  and  some  others  of 
the  new  orders  wore  white  too.  The  Cistercians  always  built 
their  monasteries  in  wild  country  places  far  from  the  towns. 
For  instance,  when  they  came  to  England  soon  after  the  year 
1100,  they  set  up  many  of  their  monasteries  in  the  wild 
districts  of  Yorkshire,  and  soon  they  turned  these  places  into 


232  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

the  most  beautiful  spots  in  the  country.  For  the  Cistercians 
were  always  very  clever  in  growing  things,  and  in  many  places, 
too,  they  covered  the  land  with  sheep.  The  wool  of  the  sheep 
was  sold  to  be  made  into  cloth. 

The  Cistercians  often  became  very  rich,  but  they  were 
very  kind  to  the  poor,  and  were  not  allowed  to  spend  much 
money  even  on  their  churches.  At  first  especially  their 
churches  were  built  very  plainly,  and  were  not  allowed  to 
have  towers  or  spires,  because  these  were  not  necessary. 
There  were  no  silver  or  gold  crosses  in  their  churches,  but 
only  painted  crosses  made  of  wood. 

But  though  the  Cistercian  monks  lived  such  strict  and 
quiet  lives  they  soon  spread  all  over  Europe.  St.  Bernard 
was  greater,  indeed,  than  any  pope,  and  the  popes  and  bishops 
of  the  time  were  glad  of  his  advice  on  all  sorts  of  things. 
He  lived  a  very  strict  life  indeed,  and  ate  so  little  food  that 
after  a  time  he  became  so  weak  that  he  was  sick  every  time 
he  took  any  food  at  all.  But  this  did  not  prevent  his  pray- 
ing and  preaching.  He  travelled  through  France  and  Italy, 
preaching  to  the  people  who  crowded  to  see  and  hear  him. 
When  once  more  an  anti-pope  was  struggling  with  the  real 
Pope,  it  was  St.  Bernard  who  got  the  anti-pope  to  give  in, 
and  so  made  peace  in  the  Church. 

St.  Bernard  was  very  severe  with  anybody  who  was 
against  the  Church  in  any  way.  In  his  time,  when  people 
were  thinking  more  and  more  about  religion,  there  were  some 
men  and  women  who  began  to  believe  things  which  the 
Church  said  were  wrong.  These  people  were  called  heretics, 
and  were  sometimes  punished  and  even  killed.  St.  Bernard 
had  no  mercy  on  such  people,  and  was  always  anxious  to  have 
them  punished,  for  he  thought  that  they  did  much  harm  to 
the  people  by  teaching  them  wrong  things.  There  were  many 
heretics  in  the  South  of  France. 

There  was  one  man  called  Peter  de  Bruys  who  was  a 
priest  but  had  done  something  very  wrong,  and  so  was  not 
allowed  to  live  any  longer  as  a  priest.     He  wandered  about 


MONKS  AND  PEOPLE  DURING  CRUSADES     233 

the  South  of  France  preaching  against  the  priests,  and  saying 
that  what  they  taught  was  wrong.  He  made  a  great  bonfire 
of  crosses  and  statues,  which  he  said  it  was  wrong  to  use. 
But  the  people  were  so  angry  that  they  took  him  and  burned 
him  aUve. 

There  was  another  man,  too,  named  Peter  Waldez,  a  rich 
merchant  belonging  to  the  French  city  of  Lyons.  He  was 
excommunicated,  but  long  after  his  death  his  followers 
wandered  about  France  and  Italy  preaching  against  the 
Church.  These  heretics  were  sometimes  called  the  Poor 
Men  of  Lyons.  The  chief  heretics  in  the  South  of  France 
were  called  the  Albigenses,  because  Albi  was  one  of  their 
chief  towns. 

St.  Bernard  was  full  of  sorrow  and  anger  against  the 
heretics,  and  he  blamed  it  all  on  one  man.  This  was  the 
famous  Abelard,  whose  life  story  is  one  of  the  saddest  and 
strangest  in  all  history.  He  was  born  in  Brittany,  and 
like  St.  Bernard  himself,  he  belonged  to  a  noble  family. 
While  he  was  still  a  young  boy  people  saw  that  he  was  going 
to  be  very  clever.  In  those  days  the  schools  were  still  joined 
to  monasteries  or  cathedrals,  but  some  of  the  schools  had 
become  more  famous  than  others,  and  when  the  news  spread 
that  a  good  teacher  was  to  be  found  at  any  particular  place, 
scholars  would  crowd  to  his  school. 

Abelard  when  he  was  a  young  man  went  from  one  great 
school  to  another.  Before  he  was  twenty  he  was  at  the 
school  belonging  to  the  Cathedral  of  Notre  Dame  at  Paris, 
listening  to  the  lectures  of  a  famous  teacher  called  William 
of  Champeaux.  But  Abelard  soon  showed  himself  much 
cleverer  than  his  master.  He  asked  questions  which  William 
could  not  answer,  and  soon  the  students  left  their  old  master, 
and  followed  Abelard  froni  place  to  place.  At  last  he  set  up 
his  school  on  the  Mont  Ste  Genevieve,  the  famous  hill  in 
Paris  looking  down  on  the  cathedral. 

Abelard's  teaching  was  very  clear.  He  said  that  people 
must  not  believe  what   they  were  told  just   because  they 


234 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


were  told,  but  that  students  should  see  the  reasons  of  the 
things  they  believed.  He  said  that  the  older  teachers  had 
not  really  tried  to  make  things  clear,  but  'lighted  a  fire,  not  to 
give  light,  but  to  fill  the  house  with  smoke.'  After  a  while 
William  of  Champeaux  found  that  he  had  no  pupils  at  all, 
and  so  gave  up  teaching  in  disgust.  Abelard  was  afterwards 
made  a  canon,  as  a  priest  belonging  to  a  cathedral  was 
called,  of  Notre  Dame  at  Paris. 

One  of  the  older  canons  named  Fulbert  had  a  young 
niece  living  in  his  house.  Her  name  was  Heloise,  and  she 
was  very  beautiful  and  very  clever.  She  could  read  Latin, 
and  even  Greek,  and  Abelard  used  to  help  her  in  her 
studies.  After  a  while  Abelard  and  Heloise  loved  each 
other  very  much,  and  in  the  end  they  were  married  to  each 
other.  Fulbert  was  very  angry  about  it  all,  because  a  priest 
was  forbidden  to  get  married.  He  was  still  more  angry 
when  Heloise  told  people  that  they  were  not  married.  She 
did  this  because  she  was  afraid  that  it  would  do  harm  to 
Abelard  if  people  knew  that  he  had  married  her.  In  the 
end  Heloise  became  a  nun,  and  Abelard  fled  away  from  the 
anger  of  her  uncle  to  a  monastery. 

He  left  the  monastery  of  St.  Denis  outside  Paris,  because 
he  quarrelled  with  the  other  monks.  Even  now  that  he  was 
a  much  sadder  and  wiser  man,  he  could  not  help  teaching 
what  he  thought  was  the  truth.  He  made  the  monks  very 
angry  by  saying  that  some  of  the  things  they  said  about 


Tending  the  sheep  in  the  eleventh  century. 

SCENES    IN    EARLV    ENGLISH 


MONKS  AND  PEOPLE  DURING  CRUSADES     235 


their  patron  saint,  St.  Denis,  were  not  true  but  only  old 
tales.     He  still  gave  lectures,  and  crowds  followed  him. 

After  a  while  he  set  up  another  monastery  in  a  lonely 
spot,  but  left  it  again,  and  Helo'ise  then  went  with  some 
nuns,  and  lived  the  rest  of  her  life  in  this  convent  of  the 
Paraclete,  as  it  was  called.  She  always  loved  Abelard,  and 
wrote  the  most  beautiful  letters  to  him,  which  we  may  still 
read. 

St.  Bernard  hated  the  teaching  of  Abelard,  not  so  much 
for  the  things  he  said  as  for  the  independent  spirit  which  he 
encouraged.  To  St.  Bernard  his  questioning  and  arguing 
about  the  things  which  the  Church  taught  seemed  little 
better  than  the  teaching  of  heretics  like  Peter  de  Bruys 
or  the  Poor  Men  of  Lyons.  At  last  St.  Bernard  got  a 
council  of  bishops  to  meet  at  the  town  of  Sens  in  France, 
and  they  said  that  Abelard's  teaching  was  heresy. 

Abelard  appealed  to  the  Pope,  that  is,  he  would  not  agree 
that  he  was  wrong,  and  offered  to  go  to  Rome  and  let  the 
Pope  judge  the  case. 

On  his  way  he  stopped  at  the  monastery  of  Cluny, 
which  then  had  for  its  abbot  a  great  and  good  man  called 
Peter  the  Venerable.  Here  Abelard  became  very  ill,  and 
Peter,  although  he  was  as  devoted  to  the  Church  and  its 
teaching  as  St.  Bernard  himself,  was  very  gentle  and  kind  to 
Abelard.  Indeed,  Abelard  begged  to  be  received  as  a  monk  of 
Cluny,  and  very  soon  afterwards  he  died.     Helo'ise  asked  that 


Mowing  and  ha^'making  in  the  eleventh  century. 


OUTDOOR    LIKE 


236  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

his  body  might  be  buried  at  her  convent  of  the  Paraclete,  and 
so  it  was.  Years  afterwards,  when  she  died  an  old  woman, 
her  body  was  buried  beside  that  of  the  man  she  had  loved 
all  her  life. 

Afterwards,  they  were  moved  from  place  to  place  for 
different  reasons,  but  now  they  rest  in  one  grave  in  the  great 
cemetery  of  Pere  Lachaise  at  Paris,  and  there  visitors  may 
see  it  any  day. 

Some  of  Abelard's  pupils  became  the  greatest  teachers  of 
the  time,  and  were  honoured  by  the  Church,  for  although 
they  taught  the  same  things  as  Abelard  they  taught  in  a 
different  way.  But  one  of  Abelard's  pupils,  a  man  called 
Arnold  of  Brescia  (a  town  in  North  Italy,  where  he  was  born), 
had  a  very  sad  ending  indeed.  He  was  a  canon  regular,  that 
is  to  say,  he  belonged  to  a  church  where  the  canons  lived  like 
monks,  although  they  did  the  work  of  ordinary  priests. 

Arnold  was  very  discontented  with  the  Church  as  it 
was.  He  said  that  priests  should  not  have  any  money  at 
all,  but  should  live  on  what  the  people  gave  them.  He 
said,  too,  that  it  was  not  right  that  the  Pope  should  rule  the 
city  of  Rome.  It  was  quite  right,  he  said,  that  the  Pope 
should  rule  the  whole  Church  in  religious  things,  but  in  things 
of  this  world  he  should  have  no  power.  He  went  to  Rome 
and  got  the  people  to  rebel  against  the  Pope  and  set  up  a 
government  of  their  own.  One  Pope  fled  away  from  Rome 
altogether,  and  for  a  time  Arnold  of  Brescia  got  his  w^ay. 

But  when  the  English  Pope,  Adrian  iv.,  had  crowned 
Frederick  Barbarossa,  the  Emperor  took  Arnold  of  Brescia 
prisoner  and  gave  him  up  to  the  Pope.  He  was  tried  for  heresy 
and  found  guilty.  He  was  killed  and  his  body  was  burnt.  The 
ashes  were  thrown  into  the  river  Tiber  for  fear  the  people  who 
had  followed  him  and  loved  him  should  carry  them  away  and 
keep  them  as  relics  of  a  saint.  Two  years  before  St.  Bernard 
himself  had  died,  he  had  called  Arnold  '  the  armour-bearer  of 
his  master  Goliath,'  meaning  Abelard. 

St.  Bernard  was  the  greatest  man  of  his  age.     His  one 


MONKS  AND  PEOPLE  DURING  CRUSADES     237 

fault  was  his  severity  to  men  like  these,  but  this  did  not 
come  from  any  cruelty,  but  because  he  was  afraid  of  the 
harm  they  might  do  to  the  Church  and  the  people.  Natur- 
ally, St.  Bernard  was  very  gentle  and  tender.  He  wrote 
some  beautiful  hymns  in  Latin,  which  are  still  sung  in  the 
Catholic  Church.  They  have  been  put  into  English  and  are 
sung  in  other  churches  too. 

England  after  the  Conquest 

We  have  seen  how  English  dukes  and  kings  took  part 
in  the  crusades.  The  English  people,  too,  shared  in  all 
the  changes  which  were  going  on  in  the  other  countries  of 
Western  Europe.  Monks  from  the  new  orders  came  to 
England,  and  monasteries  of  Cistercians,  Carthusians,  and 
regular  canons  were  spread  all  over  England.  England  had 
her  saints,  too,  in  the  twelfth  century.  The  two  greatest 
were  St.  Anselm  and  St.  Thomas  Becket.  St.  Anselm  was 
a  monk  from  that  same  abbey  of  Bee  in  Normandy  from 
which  William  the  Conqueror  had  brought  Archbishop 
Lanfranc.  Lanfranc  died  soon  after  the  Conqueror's  son, 
William  Rufus  or  the  Red,  became  king. 

The  Red  King  was  not  only  strict  like  his  father,  but 
he  was  wicked  and  cruel.  For  a  long  time  he  would  not 
have  a  new  archbishop  at  all,  but  he  became  ill,  and  was 
then  so  frightened  that  God  would  punish  him  that  he  asked 
Anselm  to  be  archbishop.  Anselm  was  very  gentle  and  good. 
When  he  was  abbot  of  Bee,  the  other  monks  were  not  always 
pleased,  for  if  he  saw  poor  and  hungry  people  he  would  give 
away  all  the  food  in  the  monastery,  never  troubling  about 
the  fact  that  there  would  be  nothing  left  for  himself  and  his 
monks  to  eat. 

Anselm  did  not  want  to  be  archbishop  of  Canterbury.  He 
knew  that  as  soon  as  the  Red  King  was  well  again,  he  would 
forget  all  about  God,  and  would  be  cruel  once  more  to  the 
Church  and  the  people,  and  he  thought  that  he  would  never 
be  strong  enough  to  struggle  with  such  a  king.     He  said  that 


238  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

it  would  never  do  for  a  '  poor  sheep '  like  himself  to  be  put 
to  the  plough  with  a  '  wild  bull '  like  Rufus,  instead  of  the 
two  strong  oxen,  William  the  Conqueror  and  Lanfranc,  who 
had  worked  together  so  well  to  make  the  English  Church 
better. 

But  the  bishops  made  him  give  in,  and  almost  carried 
him  to  the  church  to  be  made  archbishop.  Everything 
happened  just  as  St.  Anselm  expected.  When  the  Red  King 
got  well  again  he  behaved  just  as  badly  as  ever,  and  in  the 
end  St.  Anselm  fled  away  to  France,  and  stayed  there  till 
the  Red  King  died. 

Then  his  brother,  Henry  i.,  who  was  called  '  Beauclerc,' 
or  '  the  Scholar,'  became  king.  He  was  a  clever  man  and  a 
good  king,  and  he  wrote  and  asked  St.  Anselm  to  come  back, 
like  a  father,  to  his  son  Henry  and  the  English  people.  He 
came,  and  together  Henry  and  he  did  all  they  could  to  make 
the  people  and  the  priests  better.  Priests  had  been  forbidden 
to  get  married,  but  in  the  days  before  the  Norman  Conquest 
nearly  all  priests  had  wives.  But  now  this  was  strictly  for- 
bidden. 

Henry  himself  and  his  wife,  the  Good  Queen  Maud, 
gave  a  great  deal  of  money  to  set  up  new  monasteries. 
The  king  and  the  archbishop  had  one  quarrel  about  investi- 
tures, the  thing  which  the  Emperor  and  the  Pope  were 
quarrelling  about  at  the  same  time. 

In  England  it  was  soon  settled.  Bishops  w^ere  to  have 
the  ring  and  crozier  given  to  them  by  the  archbishop,  but 
were  to  do  homage  for  their  lands  to  the  king.  The  struggle 
was  settled  between  the  Pope  and  the  Emperor  in  the  same 
way  a  few  years  later.  Henry's  only  son  was  drowned  as  he 
was  sailing  from  France  to  England  in  the  '  White  Ship.' 

The  prince  had  given  the  sailors  a  great  deal  of  beer  to 
drink  in  his  honour,  and  the  nobles  and  ladies  had  danced  on 
the  deck  of  the  ship  in  the  moonlight.  But  the  sailors  were 
not  paying  attention  to  their  work,  and  though  it  was  a  beauti- 
fully still  and  clear  night,  they  let  the  ship  strike  against  a  rock. 


MONKS  AND  PEOPLE  DURING  CRUSADES     239 

It  was  wrecked,  and  every  one  was  drowned,  except  one  poor 
butcher,  who  clung  on  to  a  floating  piece  of  wood.  When 
Henry  heard  of  the  death  of  his  son,  he  was  broken-hearted, 
and  people  said  that  he  never  smiled  again.  He  got  the 
nobles  to  promise  that  they  would  have  his  daughter  Matilda 
for  queen  when  he  died. 

The  English  had  never  had  a  queen  to  rule  them  without 
a  king  before,  and  some  of  the  nobles  broke  their  promise, 
and  crowned  Henry's  nephew  Stephen,  king.  Then  for 
nearly  twenty  years  Matilda  and  Stephen  fought.  Stephen 
was  a  weak  man,  and  the  nobles  did  just  what  they  liked. 
They  built  strong  castles  all  over  England,  and  fought 
with  each  other. 

The  people  lived  in  misery,  and  the  monks  who  wrote 
their  chronicles,  the  only  books  of  history  which  there 
were  in  those  days,  give  long  and  terrible  stories  of  the 
sufferings  of  the  poor  people  when  the  cruel  nobles  took 
all  they  had  from  them  and  prevented  them  from  growing 
things  on  the  land.  It  was  the  only  time  that  the  feudal 
lords  had  things  their  own  way  in  England,  and  the  people 
could  understand  what  the  French  and  German  peoples 
suffered  until  strong  kings  saved  them  from  the  nobles. 
In  the  end  it  was  settled  that  Matilda  should  give  up  her 
right  to  the  crown,  but  that  her  son  Henry  should  be  king 
when  Stephen  died.     And  so  it  was. 

Henry  ii.  was  a  strong  king.  He  soon  put  an  end  to  the 
disorders  of  feudalism,  and  made  the  nobles  pull  down  most 
of  the  castles  which  they  had  built  in  the  time  of  Stephen. 
He  tried  to  bring  order  in  the  Church  too,  and  it  was  this 
which  brought  about  a  great  quarrel  with  Thomas  Becket, 
who  is  now  looked  upon  as  one  of  England's  greatest  saints. 
Before  William  the  Conqueror  came  to  England,  priests  and 
other  people  had  always  been  tried  and  punished  for  doing 
wrong  things  by  the  same  judges.  But  William  had  said 
that  the  Church  should  have  courts  of  its  own  and  priests 
should  be  tried  in  them  only.    This  had  been  done. 


240 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


But  the  punishments  in  the  Church  courts  were  not  so 
severe  as  in  the  other  courts.  In  those  days  every  one  who 
could  read  was  called  a  clerk  and  could  say  that  he  would  be 
tried  in  the  Church  courts.  Henry  thought  that  this  was  bad, 
for  clerks  could  even  commit  murder  and  only  have  the  easy 
punishments  given  by  the  Church  courts.  So  he  wanted  to 
have  clerks  tried  first  in  the  Church  courts,  and  if  they  were 
found  guilty  he  said  that  they  should  then  be  tried  again  in 
the  ordinary  courts  and  be  punished  just  like  other  people. 

Becket,  who  was  archbishop  of 
Canterbury,  said  that  this  was 
not  fair. 

Becket  had  at  first  been 
Henry's  chancellor,  and  had 
been  so  lively  and  fond  of 
pleasure  and  so  friendly  with 
the  king  that  Henry  thought 
that  if  he  made  him  archbishop 
he  could  have  things  all  his  own 
way  in  the  Church.  But  he 
found  out  his  mistake.  Becket 
did  not  want  to  be  archbishop, 
but  once  he  had  said  'Yes,'  he 
made  up  his  mind  to  live  like  a 
saint.  He  gave  up  all  his  old 
amusements  and  spent  his  life  in  work  and  prayer.  When 
Henry  tried  to  get  him  to  agree  to  his  new  arrangements 
for  the  Church,  there  was  a  terrible  quarrel,  and  Becket,  like 
Anselm  before  him,  fled  over  the  seas  to  be  safe  and  peaceful. 
After  six  years  he  was  allowed  to  come  back.  Henry  was 
in  France,  and  heard  there  that  Becket  had  punished  some  of 
the  bishops  for  doing  certain  things  without  his  permission 
while  he  was  away.  Henry  flew  into  a  terrible  fit  of  anger 
and  said,  '  Is  there  nobody  who  will  rid  me  of  this  insolent 
priest  ? ' 

Four  of  his  knights  who  heard  him    immediately  went 


ST.    THOMAS    BECKET    ARGUING    WITH 

KING    HENRY    II.    AND    KING    LOUIS 

OF    FRANCE 

(From  an  early  French  life  of  Becket). 


MONKS  AND  PEOPLE  DURING  CRUSADES     241 

out,  crossed  the  sea  to  England,  and  as  the  archbishop 
was  in  his  cathedral  just  before  vespers  or  evensong,  they 
attacked  him,  knocked  him  down  dead  with  his  brains  dashed 
out  on  the  stone  floor.  When  the  monks  of  the  cathedral 
took  up  his  body  to  make  it  ready  to  be  buried,  they  found 
that  the  archbishop  wore  under  all  his  splendid  robes  a  shirt 
made  of  prickly  hair  which  he  always  wore  to  do  penance  for 
his  sins.  The  people  honoured  him  as  a  saint,  and  later  he 
was  called  a  saint  by  the  Church. 

Henry  was  full  of  horror  when  he  heard  the  news. 
He  often  had  these  terrible  fits  of  anger  and  said  things 
which  he  did  not  mean.  When  he  got  back  to  England 
he  went  to  do  penance  at  the  archbishop's  tomb  in  the 
cathedral.  He  felt  that  he  had  committed  a  great  sin,  and 
he  must  have  remembered,  too,  that  Thomas  Becket  had 
once  been  his  dear  friend.  He  knelt  at  the  tomb,  dressed 
only  in  a  shirt.  He  got  the  monks  to  scourge  him  with 
a  whip,  and  then  knelt  alone  praying  at  the  tomb  during 
the  whole  night. 

For  hundreds  of  years  after  this  pilgrims  came  in  crowds 
to  pray  at  the  tomb  of  St.  Thomas  Becket,  and  it  was  soon 
covered  with  their  offerings  of  gold  and  jewels  and  became 
the  richest  shrine  in  England.  After  this  Henry  did  not 
dare  to  interfere  with  the  Church  courts,  but  in  time  the  worst 
kinds  of  crime,  whether  by  priests  or  people,  came  to  be  tried 
in  the  ordinary  courts. 

The  Great  Charter 

There  was  another  struggle  between  an  English  king  and 
the  archbishop  of  Canterbury  which  is  even  more  important 
than  the  story  of  Thomas  Becket.  After  the  death  of 
Henry  ii.,  England  was  ruled  by  Richard  of  the  Lion  Heart, 
the  great  knight  and  crusader.  He  died  soon,  and  his  wicked 
brother  John  became  king  after  him.  John  was  a  handsome 
man  and  clever,  but  he  cared  for  no  one  but  himself.     He 

Q 


242  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

was  very  cruel,  and  once  when  a  noble  rebelled  against  him 
he  starved  the  man's  wife  and  child  to  death.  He  made  the 
people  pay  great  sums  of  money  in  taxes  and  spent  it  on  his 
own  pleasures.  Another  thing  which  made  the  English 
people  very  angry  was  that  John  let  the  French  king  win 
Normandy  from  him.  This  seemed  a  great  disgrace,  but 
after  this  the  English  kings  thought  more  of  England  and 
less  of  Normandy  and  stayed  more  in  England  instead  of 
always  sailing  over  to  France.  John  had  a  great  quarrel 
with  the  Pope. 

This  Pope  was  Innocent  iii.,  the  greatest  since  Hilde- 
brand.  There  was  a  quarrel  between  the  king  and  the 
monks  of  Canterbury  about  choosing  an  archbishop,  and  in 
the  end  the  Pope  chose  one  himself.  This  was  a  good 
priest  named  Stephen  Langton.  John  said  he  would  not 
have  him  for  archbishop,  and  then  the  Pope  put  all  England 
under  an  interdict.  This  meant  that  the  churches  were 
closed.  There  could  not  be  any  services.  Babies  could  not 
be  baptized,  and  men  and  women  could  not  get  married.  All 
this  seemed  very  dreadful  to  the  people.  For  five  years  John 
would  not  let  Stephen  Langton  come  to  England.  Then  the 
Pope  said  he  should  be  king  no  longer.  This  terrified  John, 
and  he  gave  in.  The  interdict  was  taken  off  the  country. 
John  gave  up  his  crown  and  took  it  back  from  a  cardina 
who  took  the  place  of  the  Pope. 

Stephen  Langton  came  and  was  made  archbishop.  He 
immediately  began  to  help  the  nobles  to  force  King  John 
to  rule  better.  They  wrote  down  many  things  which  the 
king  was  to  promise  to  do,  and  these  promises  were  after- 
wards called  the  Great  Charter.  The  nobles  got  together 
an  army  and  marched  to  meet  the  king  at  London,  but  he 
fled  to  Windsor.  At  last  he  saw  that  he  must  give  in, 
and  at  a  place  near  by,  called  Runnymede,  he  signed  the 
Great  Charter.     But  he  never  meant  to  keep  his  promises. 

When  he  had  signed  the  Charter  and  the  nobles  had 
gone,  he  threw  himself  on  the  ground  shrieking  in  anger.. 


MONKS  AND  PEOPLE  DURING  CRUSADES     243 

Afterwards  he  got  Pope  Innocent  to  set  him  free  from 
his  promise.  Then  the  nobles  said  they  would  take  Louis, 
the  son  of  the  French  king,  to  be  king  of  England  instead 
of  John.  A  French  army  came  to  England,  but  soon 
John  died.  He  had  been  nearly  drowned  in  crossing  the 
Wash,  and  his  crown  and  jewels  were  lost  in  the  water 
with  his  other  luggage.  Afterwards  he  was  ill,  and  made 
himself  worse  by  eating  fruit  and  drinking  cider,  and  so  died. 
The  nobles  then  joined  together  and  made  John's  baby 
son,  Henry,  king.  It  is  said  that  he  was  crowned  with  his 
mother's  bracelet.  There  was  much  trouble  sometimes  after 
this,  but  after  the  Great  Charter  no  English  king  ever  dared 
again  to  treat  the  English  people  so  badly,  and  it  was  chiefly 
Stephen  Langton  whom  the  English  people  had  to  thank  for 
the  signing  of  the  Charter.  So  we  see  how  in  England,  just 
as  in  the  other  countries  of  Europe  at  that  time,  the  monks 
and  priests  took  a  leading  part  in  history.  In  the  century 
which  followed  we  shall  see  great  kings  and  soldiers  and 
greater  saints  still. 


CHAPTER  XXIV 

THE  THIRTEENTH  CENTURY 

At  the  beginning  of  the  thirteenth  century,  the  Western 
Church  was  ruled  by  the  greatest  of  all  the  popes,  Innocent  iii. 
We  have  seen  how  Pope  Innocent  interfered  in  affairs  in 
England.  But  in  all  the  other  countries  of  Europe  it  was 
the  same.  He  was  a  very  handsome  and  noble-looking 
man.  He  belonged  to  a  noble  Roman  family,  and  became 
Pope  when  he  was  only  thirty-seven  years  old,  which  was 
young  for  a  pope.  He  lived  a  good  life,  and  was  very  kind 
and  gentle,  though  sometimes  his  fierce  temper  would  break 
out. 

He  believed  that  the  Pope  should  rule  over  all  the 
world  and  that  the  kings  should  obey  him,  or  if  they  did  not, 
that  he  could  take  their  kingdoms  from  them  as  he  had 
threatened  to  do  with  John.  Pope  Innocent  was  the  first 
Pope  who  was  really  able  to  do  these  things,  and  indeed  he 
was  the  last,  for  no  Pope  after  him  was  able  to  behave  in 
this  way.  The  kings  and  people  were  ready  to  obey  the 
Pope  in  religious  matters,  but  would  not  agree  that  he  was 
over  them  in  other  things. 

Yet  Pope  Innocent  used  his  power  well.  King  Philip 
Augustus  of  France  was  growing  more  and  more  power- 
ful. It  was  he  who  won  Normandy  from  King  John,  and 
he  made  the  feudal  lords  obey  him,  so  that  France  became 
a  strong  kingdom  like  England.  But  Philip  Augustus  was 
not  a  good  man.  He  married  a  young  Danish  princess 
called   Ingeborg,   but   the    day   after  the  marriage  he  sent 


THE  THIRTEENTH  CENTURY 


245 


her  away,  and  said  he  would  not  have  her  any   more  for 
his  wife.     He  then  married  another  lady. 

Pope  Innocent  was  very  angry,  and  sent  word  to  the 
French  king  that  he  must  take  back  his  proper  wife.  Philip 
Augustus  would  not,  and  so  France,  like  Eng- 
land, was  put  under  an  interdict.  Then  the 
king  gave  in,  and  soon  after  when  the  new 
wife  died  he  took  Ingeborg  back,  but  it  was 
twenty  years  before  he  behaved  to  her  as 
though  she  was  really  his  wife.  All  this 
time  Innocent  would  not  be  friendly  with 
the  king,  but  after  this  they  became  great 
friends. 

Innocent  was  very  anxious  that  the  crusades 
should  go  on,  and  so  they  did  through  all  the    ^ .    ,  ^„ 
thirteenth    century,   but    though    great   men    \l\lS\ 
joined  them,  there  was  never  any  real  success. 
One  great  result  of  the  crusades  was  that  there 
was   much    more   trading  between   East   and 
West,  and  in  time  the  ships  of  Venice,  the 
city  which  had  grown  up  among  the  lagoons 
in  the  North  of  the  Adriatic  Sea,  got  most  of 
this  trade.     Venice  became  rich  and  import- 
ant.    At  the  same  time  the  Eastern  Empire 
lost  a  great  deal  of  its  trade  and  was  becom- 
ing  weaker  and  weaker.     Its  emperors  were 
weak   and  stupid   men.     Now,   when  in   the 
year  1203  the  Fourth  Crusade  was  begun,  it 
was  arranged  that  the  Venetian  ships  should  cathedral  at  chartres) 
carry   the    crusaders   to    the   East.      But  in- 
stead of  sailing  to  Palestine,  the  Venetians  attacked  Con- 
stantinople and  made  themselves  master  of  it. 

Constantinople  was  a  most  beautiful  city,  full  of  great 
buildings  and  statues  and  treasures,  some  of  which  belonged 
to  the  great  days  of  the  Roman  Empire.  The  Venetians 
robbed  the  churches  and  other  buildings,  and  sent  back  some 


,^_p-. 


A    POPE    IN    THE 

THIRTEENTH 

CENTURY 

(From  an  ©Id  stained- 
glass  window  in  the 


246 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


of  the  greatest  treasures  to  help  to  make  their  own  beautiful 
city  still  more  beautiful.  Most  of  the  North  Italian  cities 
were  independent  by  this  time.  Venice  was  a  republic  and 
was  ruled  by  a  duke,  the  Doge,  as  he  was  called,  chosen  by 
the  people. 

Every  year  at  the  same  date,  the  Doge,  sitting  on  a  throne 
in  a  beautiful  ship,  hung  with  scarlet  and  gold  stuffs,  sailed 
through  the  canals  of  Venice  into  the  harbour.  There  the 
Doge  dropped  a  golden  ring  into  the  water, 
saying,  '  We  wed  thee,  O  Sea,  in  token  of 
our  true  and  eternal  dominion  over  thee.' 
It  was  a  blind  old  doge  called  Dandalo 
who  led  the  Venetians  against  Constanti- 
nople on  the  Fourth  Crusade.  Pope  Inno- 
cent was  not  pleased  that  the  crusaders  had 
attacked  a  Christian  city  instead  of  the 
Mohammedans,  but  he  comforted  himself, 
for  the  church  of  the  Eastern  Empire  did 
not  obey  the  Pope,  and  now  for  nearly 
sixty  years  Constantinople  was  ruled  by 
princes  from  the  West,  just  as  the  kingdom 
of  Jerusalem  had  been.  In  the  end,  the 
Greeks  won  their  empire  back,  but  Crete 
and  other  islands  belonged  to  the  Venetians 
for  hundreds  of  years. 

Every  year  Venice  grew  richer  and  more 
beautiful.  Marble  palaces  and  churches  were  built  along  her 
canals,  and  even  now,  when  the  city  is  no  longer  great,  visitors 
gliding  in  gondolas,  as  Venetian  boats  are  called,  along  her 
canals  are  filled  with  wonder  at  their  beauty.  Pope  Innocent 
was  always  trying  to  stir  people  up  for  a  fresh  crusade,  and  in 
his  time  people  must  have  been  talking  continually  about  the 
Holy  Land. 

The  Children's  Crusade 

In  the  year  1212,  at  a  time  when  no  one  seemed  to  be 
taking  any  notice  of  the  Pope's  requests,  a  young  French 


A    DOGE    OF    VENICE 


THE  THIRTEENTH  CENTURY  247 

shepherd  boy  called  Stephen  made  up  his  mind  to  lead  a 
crusade  himself.  He  got  together  thousands  of  other  young 
boys,  and  they  marched  south  to  Marseilles  on  the  coast  of 
France.  Stephen  promised  those  who  followed  him  that  he 
would  lead  them  over  the  seas  without  wetting  their  feet. 
But  most  of  these  children,  for  they  were  only  boys,  were 
carried  off  by  slave-dealers,  and  sold  as  slaves  in  Egypt. 

About  the  same  time  a  boy  called  Nicolas,  from  Cologne 
in  Germany,  got  together  an  army  of  young  boys,  and  led 
them  into  Italy,  meaning  to  go  on  to  the  Holy  Land,  but 
no  one  knows  what  became  of  them.  These  expeditions  were 
called  the  '  Children's  Crusade,'  and  Pope  Innocent  said  to 
the  men  whom  he  wanted  to  go  to  the  Holy  Land,  *  The 
very  children  put  us  to  shame.'  At  last  a  new  crusade  did 
start. 

The  Fifth  Crusade  had  for  its  leader  the  Emperor 
Frederick  ii.,  who  was  one  of  the  greatest  men  of  the  Middle 
Ages.  He  was  the  grandson  of  Frederick  Barbarossa,  and 
his  father  was  the  Emperor  Henry  vi.  His  father  died  while 
he  was  a  baby,  and  his  mother  Constance  died  soon  afterwards. 
She  was  a  Norman,  and  from  her  he  had  the  kingdom  of 
Sicily. 

While  he  was  a  boy,  Pope  Innocent  looked  after 
Frederick.  He  was  brought  up  at  Palermo,  and  he  was  a 
very  clever  and  nice-looking  boy.  He  learned  all  he  could 
from  the  Greeks  and  Arabs  of  Sicily,  and  knew  so  much  that 
people  called  him  the  'Wonder  of  the  World.'  Pope  Innocent 
died  when  Frederick  was  only  twenty. 

Although  Frederick  had  been  brought  up  by  a  pope,  this 
did  not  prevent  him  from  quarrelling  with  the  popes  who 
came  after.  Indeed,  the  quarrel  between  the  Emperor  and 
the  popes  was  perhaps  bitterer  than  ever  under  Frederick  ii. 
Frederick  pretended  to  be  a  good  Christian,  but  people  said 
that  he  did  not  really  believe  the  things  which  the  Church 
taught.  He  made  friends  with  the  Arabs  in  Sicily  and  South 
Italy,  and  lived  in  great  luxury  like  they  did.     He  gathered 


248 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


FREDERICK    11.    OF    GERMANY 

(From  a  drawing  in  a  treatise  on  hawking  and 
hunting  written  by  the  Emperor  himself). 


scholars  and  poets  together  in  his  palace,  and  even  studied  the 
use  of  medicines.  He  had  a  great  number  of  camels  brought 
from  the  East,  and  the  Sultan  of  Egypt  sent  him  a  present 
of  an  elephant,  which  people  thought  a  very  curious  and 
wonderful  animal.     Very  few  people  had  ever  seen  such  a 

thing,  although  four  hundred 
years  before  Charles  the 
Great  had  had  one  too. 

The  Pope  after  Innocent 
was  called  Honorius  iii.  He 
had  once  been  Frederick's 
teacher,  and  was  always  very 
gentle  with  him.  But  Fre- 
derick only  made  use  of  his 
friendship  to  please  himself. 
He  got  the  Pope  to  agree  to 
his  son  becoming  emperor 
after  him,  although  he  had 
promised  that  he  would  not  make  him  emperor  and  king  of 
Sicily  too,  as  the  Pope  thought  that  this  was  too  much  power 
for  one  man.  All  during  the  time  of  Honorius,  Frederick 
was  promising  to  go  on  crusade,  but  he  never  did. 

Then  the  new  Pope,  Gregory  ix.,  at  last  lost  patience,  and 
excommunicated  Frederick  for  not  keeping  his  promise.  Then 
at  last  Frederick  led  a  great  army  to  the  East,  and  now  the 
Pope  was  angry  again,  for  he  said  that  a  man  under  sentence 
of  excommunication  should  not  dare  to  fight  in  the  Holy  War. 
There  was  practically  no  fighting,  but  Frederick  made  a  ten 
years' peace  with  the  Mohammedans,  and  Bethlehem,  Nazareth, 
and  Jerusalem  were  handed  over  to  the  Christians.  Frederick 
crowned  himself  king  of  Jerusalem,  but  no  priest  could  be 
got  to  go  through  the  services  of  the  Church  for  him. 

Frederick  then  went  back  to  Italy,  where  he  found  the 
Pope's  armies  in  Apulia,  part  of  his  kingdom  in  South  Italy. 
Frederick  soon  drove  them  out,  and  then  at  last  peace  was 
made  between  the  Pope  and  the  Emperor.     Frederick  cared 


THE  THIRTEENTH  CENTURY  249 

much  more  for  Italy  than  he  did  for  Germany.  In  his 
kingdom  in  the  South  he  made  himself  a  despot.  No  one  else 
had  any  power  at  all.  But  in  Germany  he  let  the  great  lords 
do  what  they  liked,  and  although  his  father  and  grandfather 
had  done  a  great  deal  to  join  the  German  states  into  one 
kingdom,  Frederick  let  them  become  almost  independent, 
and  it  was  this  which  helped  to  keep  Germany  broken  up  for 
hundreds  of  years  into  little  states,  instead  of  being  one 
nation  like  France  or  England. 

Frederick's  son  Henry,  who  was  to  be  emperor  after  him, 
rebelled  against  his  father  and  was  shut  up  in  prison  in 
Apulia.  There  he  was  to  stay  until  he  died,  but  he  escaped, 
and,  as  he  preferred  to  die  rather  than  be  caught  and  put  in 
prison  again,  he  drove  his  horse  over  a  high  precipice,  and  so 
killed  himself. 

Frederick  had  a  long  struggle,  too,  with  the  towns  of 
Northern  Italy,  and  won  great  victories  over  them,  and  he 
quarrelled  once  more  with  the  Pope.  Frederick  invited  all 
kings  and  princes  to  join  him  in  fighting  against  the  Pope,  for 
he  said  the  Pope  wanted  to  take  all  power  from  them,  but 
the  other  kings  took  no  notice.  Pope  Gregory  in  his  turn 
said  that  Frederick  was  wicked  in  his  life  and  a  heretic  in  his 
beliefs,  and  tried  to  get  the  Germans  to  rebel  against  him. 
He  even  offered  the  Emperor's  crown  to  the  brother  of  King 
Louis  IX.  of  France,  but  the  French  nobles  told  the  Pope 
that  he  could  not  give  or  take  a  king's  crown,  except  with 
the  advice  of  a  general  council,  that  is,  a  meeting  of  bishops 
from  different  parts  of  the  world. 

Pope  Gregory  did  try  to  get  a  council  together  at  Rome. 
The  ships  of  Genoa  were  to  carry  the  bishops  to  the  council, 
but  Frederick  had  nearly  all  the  greatest  towns  on  the  coast 
of  Italy  on  his  side ;  chief  of  them  was  Pisa.  They  got 
together  a  fleet,  and  captured  the  Genoese  ships.  The 
bishops  were  carried  off  to  Naples,  and  were  tormented  with 
hunger  and  thirst  and  then  thrown  into  prison.  Frederick 
was  even  going  to  attack  Rome  when  Pope  Gregory  died. 


250  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

A  new  pope,  Innocent  iv.,  was  just  as  bitter  as  Gregory, 
and  the  Emperor  again  threatened  to  attack  Rome.  Innocent 
fled  to  Lyons  in  the  South  of  France,  and  there  called  a 
council,  which  said  that  Frederick  should  be  Emperor  no 
longer.  King  Louis  of  France  tried  to  make  peace,  but 
the  enemies  were  too  bitter.  Rebellion  broke  out  against 
Frederick  in  different  parts  of  Germany  and  Italy,  and  in 
these  later  years  of  his  life  he  lost  instead  of  winning  battles. 
Frederick  grew  very  unhappy,  and  began  to  look  on  every 
one  as  his  enemy. 

He  thought  that  his  faithful  friend,  Peter  della  Vigna, 
who  had  always  served  him  well,  had  turned  against  him,  and 
he  had  his  eyes  put  out.  He  then  dragged  him  with  him, 
dressed  in  rags,  wherever  he  went,  until  in  the  end  Peter 
killed  himself.  Frederick's  favourite  son  Enzio  was  taken 
prisoner  by  the  people  of  Bologna,  one  of  the  North  Italian 
cities  which  fought  against  him,  and  the  Emperor  was  told 
that  he  was  to  be  kept  in  prison  all  his  life.  Soon  after 
Frederick  became  very  ill  and  died.  It  was  said  that  he  made 
peace  with  the  Church,  and  had  himself  dressed  in  the  habit 
of  a  Cistercian  monk,  and  so  died  peacefully  and  happily. 
Others  said  that  he  died  cursing,  and  in  the  greatest  misery, 
but  probably  this  is  not  true. 

Frederick  ii.  was  the  last  of  the  great  emperors  who 
struggled  against  the  great  popes.  When  Frederick  ii.  died 
his  son  Conrad  ruled  as  king  in  Germany.  He  sent  his 
brother  Manfred  to  rule  Sicily  for  him.  But  the  Pope  was 
no  more  friendly  to  Conrad  than  he  had  been  to  Frederick. 
He  offered  Sicily  to  different  people,  among  them  Henry  iii. 
of  England,  who  gladly  paid  large  sums  of  money  to  the 
Pope,  who  promised  Sicily  to  Henry's  second  son,  Edmund. 

A  crusade  was  preached  against  Conrad  and  fighting 
began,  but  before  long  the  Emperor  died,  leaving  a  little  son 
called  Conradin.  Manfred  then  fought  and  won  Naples  and 
Sicily  for  himself,  but  the  Pope  now  offered  the  crown  of 
Sicily  to  Charles  of  Anjou,  the  brother  of  King  Louis  ix.  of 


A    GREAT    GOTHIC    BUILDING  :    THE    CATHEDRAL    AT    RHEIMS,    BUILT    IN 
THE    I3TH    AND    14TH    CENTURIES. 
(From  a  photo  by  NeurdeinJ 


THE  THIRTEENTH  CENTURY  251 

France.  Charles  led  a  great  army  against  Manfred  and  killed 
him. 

Conradin  was  now  fifteen  years  old.  He  was  a  brave 
and  handsome  boy,  and  he  made  up  his  mind  to  march  from 
Germany  and  win  back  the  kingdom  of  the  two  Sicilies  from 
Charles  of  Anjou.  He  took  with  him  his  dearest  friend 
Frederick,  Duke  of  Austria,  and  a  small  army,  but  he  was 
taken  prisoner,  and  he  and  his  friend  had  their  heads  cut 
off  by  Charles's  order. 

Charles  of  Anjou  was  a  cruel  ruler,  and  the  people  of 
Sicily  and  South  Italy  hated  him.  They  hated  him,  too, 
for  his  cruelty  to  Conradin.  As  Conradin  was  going  to  lay 
his  head  on  the  block,  he  had  thrown  down  his  glove  (which 
was  the  way  a  knight  invited  another  to  fight),  and  had  declared 
that  the  German  people  would  wash  out  in  French  blood  this 
insult  to  their  king. 

It  was  not  very  many  years  before  the  Sicilians  them- 
selves took  a  terrible  revenge  on  their  French  rulers.  A 
French  soldier  insulted  a  Sicilian  girl  on  the  street,  and  her 
lov^er  stabbed  him  to  the  heart.  It  was  the  signal  for  an  attack 
on  all  the  French  in  the  island.  The  massacre  began  as  the 
church  bells  were  ringing  for  vespers,  and  went  on  through 
the  whole  night.  It  was  always  afterwards  spoken  of  as  the 
Sicilian  Vespers.  Soon  after  Pedro  of  Aragon,  the  husband 
of  Conradin  s  cousin,  fought  Charles  and  won  Sicily  from  him. 
French  rulers  still  governed  Naples,  but  in  a  few  years  this, 
too,  went  to  a  Spanish  ruler.  Conradin  was  the  last  of  the 
family  of  Frederick  ii. 

After  his  death,  the  seven  German  princes  who  had  the 
right  of  electing  the  Emperor,  chose  foreigners  like  Richard, 
duke  of  Cornwall,  the  brother  of  Henry  iii.  of  England,  or 
Alfonso  the  Wise,  king  of  Castile.  But  at  last  they  saw 
that  they  must  elect  a  German  prince,  so  that  the  Emperor 
could  keep  order  between  the  states.  But  after  Frederick's 
time  these  rulers  were  German  kings  and  hardly  interfered 
at  all  in  Italy.     The  great  towns  of  Northern  Italy  began 


252  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

each  to  conquer  the  smaller  towns  round  them,  and  soon 
Venice,  Milan  and  Florence  was  each  the  capital  of  a  little 
Italian  state. 

St.  Louis  of  France 

King  Louis  ix.  of  France,  who  had  tried  to  make  peace 
between  the  Pope  and  the  Emperor,  was  very  different  from 
Frederick.  He  was  a  saint  and  a  splendid  king  besides.  He, 
too,  had  become  king  as  a  baby,  when  his  father,  Louis  viii., 
the  son  of  Philip  Augustus,  died.  His  mother  was  a  Spanish 
lady,  Blanche  of  Castile.  She  was  a  very  brave  and  determined 
woman,  and  when  the  feudal  nobles,  whom  Philip  Augustus 
had  kept  in  order,  tried  to  get  their  own  way  again  she  soon 
put  down  their  rebellion.  She  looked  well  after  her  boy, 
and  had  him  carefully  taught  and  trained,  so  that  he  was  not 
at  all  spoilt  by  being  a  king  so  soon. 

He  loved  his  prayers,  and  when  he  was  grown  up  he 
would  get  up  at  midnight  to  go  t;o  matins  in  the  church  just 
as  the  monks  did.  His  nobles,  indeed,  grumbled  because 
they  said  he  wasted  so  much  time  in  prayer,  but  he  reminded 
them  that  they  wasted  more  time  still  in  gambling  and 
hunting. 

But  St.  Louis  was  not  sad  or  gloomy.  He  was  always 
good-tempered  and  patient,  and  could  not  bear  people  to 
say  unkind  things  about  each  other.  He  hated  swearing 
or  rough  ways  of  speaking.  Every  day  he  brought  a  hundred 
poor  people  to  eat  at  his  table.  For  himself  he  took  any 
food  which  was  set  before  him,  and  always  added  water  to  his 
wine.  He  went  to  see  sick  people  in  their  homes,  and  would 
wash  the  feet  of  beggars  and  even  nursed  lepers. 

Yet  St.  Louis  found  plenty  of  time,  too,  to  rule  his 
country  well.  He  was  strong  and  healthy,  taller  by  a  head 
than  any  of  his  knights,  finely  shaped  with  bright  eyes  and 
long  fair  hair.  He  loved  his  children  very  much,  and  was 
a  splendid  husband  and  father.  He  kept  France  orderly  and 
happy,  and  although  he  was  strict  with  the  feudal  lords  he 


THE  THIRTEENTH  CENTURY 


253 


never  cheated  them  or  used  them  roughly  as  his  grandfather, 
Philip  Augustus,  had  done.  There  was  never  a  better  king 
or  a  nobler  knight  than  St.  Louis  of  France. 

St.  Louis  went  twice  on  crusade.     The  first  time  was  in 

the  year  1248.       Four  years  

before  the  Christians  had 
again  lost  Jerusalem,  and  this 
time  they  lost  it  for  ever.  It 
was  the  Sultan  of  Egypt  who 
had  captured  it,  and  it  was 
against  him  that  St.  Louis  led 
his  army. 

St.  Louis  was  a  brave 
soldier  and  a  good  leader,  but 
the  swampy  lands  of  the 
mouth  of  the  Nile  were  diffi- 
cult to  cross  for  soldiers  who 
were  not  used  to  them.  The 
heat  was  dreadful,  and  there 
was  very  little  food.  A 
plague  broke  out  among  the 
soldiers,  and  soon  St.  Louis 
was  taken  prisoner.  His 
whole  army  laid  down  their 
arms,  but  nearly  all  were 
killed.  Only  St.  Louis  and 
the  rich  lords  were  kept  alive 
and  set  free  when  a  large 
ransom  was  paid. 

Then  St.  Louis  went  on  to  the  Holy  Land,  but  he  would 
not  go  to  Jerusalem,  for,  like  Richard  of  the  Lion  Heart,  he 
could  not  bear  to  see  the  Holy  City,  when  he  knew  that  he 
could  not  win  it  back  for  tlie  Christians.  St.  Louis  brought 
back  to  France  a  crown  of  thorns,  which  was  said  to  be  that 
with  which  Our  Lord  was  crowned,  and  the  lance  which 
pierced  His  side  and  the  sponge  which  moistened  His  lips. 


ST.    LOUIS,    KING    OF    FRANCE,    CROSSES 
THE    SEA    TO    THE    HOLY    LAND 

(From  a  thirteenth-century  stained-glass 
window  in  the  Abbey  of  St.  Denis). 


254  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

He  built  a  beautiful  little  cbapel  in  Paris  in  which  these 
relics  were  kept.  It  was  called  the  Sainte  Chapelle,  and 
may  still  be  seen  to-day.  After  St.  Louis  came  back  from 
the  crusade  he  always  wore  quite  plain  woollen  clothes  in 
winter  and  robes  of  dark-coloured  silks  in  summer. 

The  Christians  still  had  Antioch  and  the  other  cities  of 
the  kingdom  of  Jerusalem,  but  they  were  always  quarrel- 
ling among  themselves.  At  last  the  Sultan  of  Egypt  took 
Antioch  too,  and  threatened  Acre  and  the  other  cities. 
Once  more  St.  Louis  got  ready  to  go  on  crusade,  but  he 
died  on  the  way  in  the  year  1270.  His  last  words  were, 
'  Jerusalem,  Jerusalem.'  His  followers  sadly  carried  his  body 
back  to  France.  Charles  of  Anjou,  the  cruel  king  of  Sicily, 
was  with  St.  Louis  when  he  died  at  Tunis.  Charles  was  only 
anxious  to  win  something  for  himself  from  the  crusade,  and 
made  peace  when  the  ruler  of  Tunis  promised  to  pay  the 
double  of  the  tribute  to  the  kings  of  Sicily  which  he  was 
already  paying. 

Edward  of  England,  the  son  of  the  English  king  Henry  iii. 
and  grandson  of  King  John,  sailed  up  to  join  the  crusade, 
just  as  the  treaty  had  been  signed.  He  was  very  angry,  and 
sailed  on  with  his  own  thirteen  ships  to  Acre.  He  stayed  in 
the  Holy  Land  a  year,  but  once  more  Charles  of  Anjou 
arranged  for  peace  with  the  Sultan  of  Egypt.  The  Sultan 
tried  to  have  Edward  secretly  killed  with  a  poisoned  weapon, 
but  he  was  wounded  and  not  killed.  His  good  wife  Eleanor 
sucked  the  poison  from  the  wound,  and  so  saved  his  life. 

The  End  of  the  Crusades 

Edward  left  the  Holy  Land  to  come  back  to  be  king  of 
England  when  his  father  died.  He  was  the  last  great 
Western  prince  who  really  went  on  crusade.  A  year  or  two 
later  the  Pope  preached  a  great  crusade,  but  died  before  it 
started,  and  the  crusade  was  given  up.  In  a  few  years  more 
even  the   few   places   which   remained   of   the   kingdom   of 


THE  THIRTEENTH  CENTURY  255 

Jerusalem  were  taken  by  the  Mohammedans,  and  only  a  few 
ruins  remain  to-day  to  tell  the  tale. 

The  crusades  may  seem  to  us  to  have  failed  altogether, 
but  after  all  great  things  had  been  done  in  them,  and  though 
some  of  the  men  who  joined  them  were  selfish  and  ambitious, 
many  others  were  very  noble.  It  was  a  splendid  thing  that 
the  kings  and  princes  of  Europe  could  agree  to  go  together, 
and  fight  for  their  religion  in  far-off  lands.  It  was  a  pity 
that  they  could  not  always  agree,  and  that  the  journeys 
were  not  arranged  better.  If  only  the  kingdom  of  Jerusalem 
had  been  kept  in  the  hands  of  Christians,  the  Turks  who  have 
since  conquered  Greece  and  other  parts  of  Eastern  Europe, 
and  ruled  them  very  cruelly,  might  have  been  kept  out  of 
Europe  altogether. 

Edward  of  England,  the  last  of  the  great  crusaders,  was 
called  Edward  i.  when  he  became  king  of  England.  There 
had  been  other  kings  named  Edward,  but  not  since  the 
Norman  Conquest,  and  it  was  from  that  time  that  the  kings 
were  now  counted.  But  by  the  time  Edward  became  king 
of  England,  the  English  and  the  Normans  in  England  had 
become  one  people.  Edward  was  an  old  English  name,  and 
Edward  i.  was  a  real  English  king. 

In  his  reign  the  English  language  began  to  be  used  in  the 
courts  of  law.  Before  that  French  had  been  spoken  there. 
Edward  was  a  fine  handsome  man,  like  St.  Louis,  taller  by 
a  head  than  ordinary  men.  He  was  not  a  saint,  but  he  was 
a  very  good  man.  Even  when  he  was  a  boy,  he  had  been 
very  wise  and  sensible.  His  father,  Henry  iii.,  the  son  of 
John,  who  was  crowned  king  of  England  while  still  a  baby, 
had  not  been  a  very  good  ruler.  He  was  a  good  man,  but 
not  a  wise  king.  He  loved  poetry  and  artistic  things,  and 
in  those  days  the  French  people  knew  much  more  about  these 
things  than  the  English  did.  Henry  filled  his  court  with 
Frenchmen.  Some  of  them  were  wicked  and  greedy  men, 
and  very  cruel  to  the  people. 

At  last  a  great  English  nobleman,  called  Earl  Simon  de 


256  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

Montfort,  made  up  his  mind  to  fight  the  king  and  make  him 
send  away  the  foreigners,  and  rule  England  properly.  Earl 
Simon  took  the  king  prisoner,  and  the  young  Edward  too,  but 
after  a  time  Edward  got  away,  and  he  himself  got  together  an 
army  and  fought  against  Earl  Simon.  A  great  battle  was 
fought  at  Evesham  in  the  South  of  England,  and  Earl  Simon 
was  killed.  Then  Henry  was  able  to  rule  England  again,  but 
Edward  told  him  that  Earl  Simon  was  quite  right  in  wanting 
him  to  send  the  foreigners  away,  and  so  Henry  ruled  England 
with  Edward's  advice  until  he  died,  and  when  Edward 
became  king  he,  too,  remembered  the  lessons  he  had  learnt 
from  Earl  Simon,  and  ruled  England  well  and  wisely.  So 
although  Earl  Simon  died  in  a  struggle  against  his  king, 
England  ought  to  be  very  grateful  to  him,  for  he  fought  and 
died  for  the  sake  of  his  country. 

One  great  thing  Edward  learned  from  Earl  Simon.  Ever 
since  the  Norman  Conquest,  the  kings  of  England,  when  they 
asked  advice  at  all,  had  called  a  meeting  of  the  great  nobles  ; 
but  Simon  de  Montfort  got  each  county  to  choose  men  to 
send  to  parliament,  and  told  some  of  the  chief  towns  to  do 
so  too,  and  so  the  ordinary  people  began  to  have  a  share  in 
the  government  of  the  country.  King  Edward  saw  that  this 
was  a  good  thing,  and  so  he  did  the  same,  and  this  is  how 
our  parliament  really  began. 

Edward  i.  was  a  very  brave  soldier.  He  was  anxious 
to  win  Wales  and  Scotland,  and  join  them  to  England.  In 
his  time  Wales,  whose  people  were  descendants  of  the  Britons, 
who  had  been  driven  West  by  the  English  when  they  first 
came  to  this  country,  was  ruled  by  princes  of  their  own. 
Edward  made  the  princes  pay  tribute  to  the  English  king, 
and  afterwards  when  they  rebelled,  he  conquered  Wales,  and 
it  has  belonged  to  England  ever  since. 

He  tried  to  do  the  same  with  Scotland,  but  Scottish  heroes 
like  Robert  Bruce  and  William  Wallace  fought  hard  for  their 
country,  and  all  his  life  Edward  was  fighting  to  win  Scotland, 
but  never  did.     He  died  on  his  way  with  an  army  to  Scotland, 


THE  THIRTEENTH  CENTURY  257 

and  he  told  his  son,  who  became  Edward  ii.,  to  carry  his 
body  with  him  to  battle,  and  never  to  bury  it  until  Scotland 
had  been  won. 

But  Edward  ii.  was  a  weak  and  foolish  king.  He  took  no 
notice  of  his  promise,  and  soon  Scotland  was  quite  free  from 
England,  and  remained  so  for  three  hundred  years  longer, 
when  a  Scottish  king  became  king  of  England  too,  and 
so  joined  the  two  countries.  But  in  spite  of  his  failures, 
Edward  i.  was  perhaps  the  greatest  of  our  old  English  kings 
and  one  of  the  noblest  knights  of  his  time. 


R 


CHAPTER  XXV 

ST.  DOMINIC  AND  ST.  FRANCIS 

We  have  already  seen  how  full  of  great  men  the  thirteenth 
century  was.  There  were  great  popes  Hke  Pope  Innocent  iii., 
great  kings  like  St.  Louis  of  France  and  Edward  i.  of  England, 
and  great  emperors  like  Frederick  ii. 

But  the  greatest  men  of  all  in  that  wonderful  time  were 
two  saints,  St.  Francis  of  Assisi  and  St.  Dominic.  Both 
these  saints  founded  new  orders  which  were  different  from 
the  older  orders  of  monks,  and  did  work  especially  needed 
at  the  time.  The  stories  of  the  two  saints  are  very  much 
alike  and  yet  very  different. 

St.  Francis  was  born  in  a  little  town  called  Assisi,  among 
the  hills  in  the  middle  of  Italy.  His  real  name  was  John 
Bernadone,  but  his  father,  who  was  a  cloth-merchant,  called 
Mm  'little  Francis,'  or  the  little  Frenchman,  and  the  boy 
kept  the  name  when  he  grew  up.  In  those  days  there  were 
not,  of  course,  any  big  shops  like  there  are  to-day.  Merchants 
travelled  from  place  to  place  selling  their  goods,  and  Pietro 
Bernadone,  the  father  of  St.  Francis,  travelled  a  great  deal 
in  France.  Pietro  gained  a  good  deal  of  money,  and  the 
little  Francis  was  always  well  dressed.  He  was  a  merry 
little  boy  with  dark  skin  and  laughing  brown  eyes,  and  he 
was  always  the  leader  in  fun  and  mischief  with  the  other 
boys  of  Assisi. 

But  as  he  grew  up  into  a  young  man,  he  grew  very 
serious  indeed.  It  was  a  time  when  men  were  growing  more 
religious,  and  Francis  could  think  of  nothing  else.  His 
father  was  very  angry  once  when  Francis,  who  was  helping 

258 


ST.  DOMINIC  AND  ST.  FRANCIS  259 

him  with  his  business,  sold  a  great  deal  of  cloth,  and  gave 
the  money  to  a  priest  to  help  him  to  build  again  his  poor 
little  chapel,  which  was  falling  into  ruins. 

Pietro  now  said  he  would  have  nothing  more  to  do  with 
him,  and  took  him  before  the  bishop  of  Assisi  to  have  him 
disinherited,  that  is  to  say,  that  nothing  he  possessed  should 
ever  go  to  his  son.  Francis  said  that  this  only  made  him 
understand  better  than  ever  that  he  had  no  father  except 
his  Father  in  heaven.  He  took  off  his  clothes,  saying  that 
he  would  have  nothing  at  all  which  came  from  his  father 
on  earth. 

The  bishop  gave  Francis  a  cloak,  and  for  the  next  few  years 
Francis  lived  as  a  beggar  in  Assisi,  nursing  the  sick  and 
helping  the  poor.  When  he  was  a  boy  he  had  had  a  great 
horror  of  the  terrible  disease  of  leprosy,  but  now  he  made 
it  his  special  duty  to  take  care  of  the  lepers. 

There  was  a  little  old  chapel  in  the  flat  land  below  the 
hills  of  Assisi.  It  was  called  the  Chapel  of  St.  Mary  of  the 
Angels.  One  day,  when  St.  Francis  was  hearing  Mass  there, 
he  suddenly  thought  of  the  words  of  our  Lord  in  the  Bible, 
which  told  the  apostles  to  preach  the  gospel  and  to  '  carry 
neither  gold  nor  silver,  nor  money  in  their  girdles,  nor  bag, 
nor  two  coats,  nor  sandals,  nor  staff.'  It  seemed  to  Francis 
that  these  words  were  spoken  to  him,  and  though  he  was 
not  a  priest  he  went  up  to  Assisi  and  began  to  preach  to 
the  people.  Other  young  men  joined  him,  and  when  there 
were  twelve  of  them  altogether  Francis  said,  '  Let  us  go  to 
Rome  and  ask  the  blessing  of  the  Pope.' 

And  so  they  did.  With  bare  feet  and  dressed  only  in 
rough  brown  frocks,  with  a  rope  tied  round  the  waist  for 
girdles,  they  went  to  Rome,  and  Pope  Innocent  iii.  blessed 
them  and  agreed  to  their  way  of  living,  and  St.  Francis  went 
back  happily  to  Assisi.  Many  of  his  old  companions  who 
had  laughed  at  him,  and  thrown  stones  at  him  when  he  first 
began  to  live  like  a  beggar,  now  followed  him.  It  was  very 
difficult  not  to  love  Francis,  for  he  himself  loved  everybody 


260  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

and  everything.  His  great  wish  was  to  live  just  as  Our 
Lord  had  lived  and  to  be  as  meek  and  gentle  as  possible. 

Perhaps  no  one  who  has  ever  lived  has  been  so  nearly- 
perfect  as  St.  Francis  was.  He  loved  poverty  for  Christ's 
sake,  and  was  never  happier  than  when  quite  without  food. 
No  Franciscan,  as  the  men  who  joined  the  new  order  were 
called,  were  allowed  to  carry  money.  They  had  to  beg  for 
food,  and  if  no  one  gave  it  to  them,  then  they  must  go  with- 
out and  be  glad  for  Christ's  sake. 

Yet  St.  Francis  was  always  joyful  and  even  merry.  He 
would  sing  as  he  tramped  barefoot  along  the  dusty  roads  of 
Italy,  for  soon  the  Franciscans  began  to  go  from  place  to 
place  to  preach.  He  said  that  poverty  was  his  lady  and  his 
bride,  and  he  loved  her  more  than  any  man  could  love  a 
wife.  Franciscans  were  soon  travelling  in  all  the  countries 
of  Europe.  They  were  called  Friars  Minor  or  '  Little 
Brothers.'  Wherever  they  went  they  lived  as  St.  Francis 
had  taught  them. 

All  over  Western  Europe  now  towns  were  growing  up, 
and  in  most  of  them  there  were  very  poor  people.  It  was 
in  the  poorest  parts  of  the  towns  that  the  Franciscans  built 
their  houses  and  churches.  At  first  these  houses  were  very 
plain,  although  the  thirteenth  century  was  the  time  when  the 
great  Gothic  churches,  with  their  pointed  arches  and  beautiful 
carvings  and  statues,  were  being  built.  After  a  time  the 
Franciscans  forgot  some  of  the  things  St.  Francis  had  told 
them,  and  built  fine  churches  too,  but  not  at  first. 

The  Franciscans  preached  in  plain  simple  language,  so  that 
the  people  could  understand  easily,  and  so  they  taught  and 
comforted  the  people  whom  the  ordinary  priests  had  often 
left  quite  to  themselves.  The  older  orders  of  monks  had 
often  become  very  rich  by  this  time,  and  also  they  had  their 
monasteries  chiefly  in  the  country.  The  Franciscans  travelled, 
too,  into  far-off  countries.  St.  Francis  himself  went  to  the 
Holy  Land  and  preached  on  the  way  to  the  Sultan  of  Egypt. 

Before  the  century  was  over,  Franciscans  travelled  right 


ST.  DOMINIC  AND  ST.  FRANCIS 


261 


across  Asia  and  preached  at  the  court  of  the  *  Great  Khan,' 
the  ruler  of  a  people  called  the  Mongols. 

St.  Francis  lived  the  last  years  of  his  life  at  Assisi,preaching 
and  praying.  His  chief  thought  was  of  the  terrible  sufferings 
of  Our  Lord,  and  before  he  died,  in  some  mysterious  way,  his 
own  hands  and  feet  and  breast  had  on  them  wounds  like  those 
made  by  the  nails  and  lance  in  the  Body  of  Christ. 


ST.     FRANCIS    OF    ASSIST    TAKES    THE    '  LADV    POVERTY  '    TO    BE    HIS    BRIDE 
(From  the  painting  by  Giotto  in  the  Church  of  St.  Francis  at  Assist). 


When  St.  Francis  died,  his  body  was  buried  at  Assisi,  and 
a  great  church  was  built  above  his  tomb.  On  the  walls  there 
may  still  be  seen  wonderful  paintings  by  Giotto,  one  of  the 
earliest  of  the  great  Italian  painters.  In  them  we  may  see 
stories  of  the  life  of  St.  Francis,  and  there  is  one  very  beautiful 
picture  which  shows  St.  Francis  taking  the  *  Lady  Poverty ' 
for  his  bride. 

After  the  death  of  St.  Francis  the  Franciscans  still  went 


262  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

on  with  their  work,  but  in  time  they  came  to  use  money  and 
to  live  very  much  like  the  older  monks,  though  they  always 
went  on  doing  good  work  among  the  poor,  and  even  in 
England  to-day  we  may  still  find  the  friars  of  St.  Francis 
doing  the  work  which  St.  Francis  and  his  companions  did 
seven  hundred  years  ago. 

St.  Dominic  lived  and  did  his  work  at  the  same  time  as 
St.  Francis.  He  was  a  Spaniard,  and  belonged  to  a  noble 
family  of  Castile.  Very  early  he  became  a  priest  and  a 
regular  canon.  While  on  a  visit  to  the  South  of  France,  he 
made  up  his  mind  to  spend  his  life  in  preaching  against  the 
heretics  there,  who  were  called  the  Albigensians.  Although 
these  people  thought  that  they  were  much  better  than 
ordinary  Christians,  they  taught  some  very  dreadful  things. 
They  thought  that  everything  about  the  body  was  bad,  and 
that  only  the  soul  was  good.  They  even  thought  it  was  a 
noble  thing  to  starve  oneself  to  death,  or  to  kill  babies  and 
so  free  their  souls  from  their  bodies. 

St.  Dominic  went  about  preaching  better  things  to  these 
heretics,  and  other  young  men  joined  him.  They  wore  a 
white  frock  with  a  black  cloak,  and  were  soon  called  the 
Preaching  Friars. 

St.  Dominic,  like  St.  Francis,  wished  his  friars  to  be  poor, 
and  for  a  long  time  they  lived  very  much  like  the  Franciscans. 
But  their  chief  work  was  preaching  against  heresy.  St. 
Dominic  was  very  gentle  like  St.  Francis.  He  would  spend 
his  nights  on  the  stone  floors  of  a  church,  only  stopping  in  his 
prayers  to  go  quietly  to  look  at  his  friars  as  they  lay  sleeping, 
and  to  cover  them  up  more  warmly.  He  could  not  bear  to 
see  other  people  suffering,  and  would  cry  from  pity. 

He  had  a  very  noble  and  beautiful  face,  and  his  friars 
said  that  a  heavenly  light  shone  round  his  head.  He  had 
very  beautiful  hands.  St.  Dominic's  preaching  did  not  put 
an  end  to  the  heresy  of  the  Albigensians,  and  in  the  end 
the  Pope  preached  a  great  crusade  against  them.  Simon  de 
Montfort,  the  father  of  the  great  Earl  Simon  who  fought 


ST.  DOMINIC  AND  ST.  FRANCIS 


263 


against  Henry  iii.,  led  this  crusade,  and  in  the  end  the 
Albigensians  were  nearly  all  killed,  and  so  their  heresy  died 
out.  But  St.  Dominic  himself  did  not  take  any  part  in 
the  crusade.  He  trusted  altogether  to  preaching  the  truth, 
and  hated  the  idea  of  fighting.  Both  the  Dominicans  and 
Franciscans  often  preached  in  the  open  air,  and  great  crowds 
of  people  would  gather  round  to  hear  them. 

The  Black  Friars,  as  the  Dominicans  were  soon  called 
because  of  their  black  cloaks, 
were  always  good  scholars,  and 
very  soon  they  became  the 
greatest  teachers  of  philosophy 
and  theology  in  all  the  coun- 
tries of  Europe.  The  schools, 
like  that  at  Paris  where  Abe- 
lard  had  taught,  had  now  been 
turned  into  universities.  In 
the  universities  the  teachers 
banded  themselves  together, 
and  got  privileges  from  kings 
or  popes.  There  were  soon 
universities  in  most  of  the  great 
towns,  where  great  teachers 
had  taught  in  the  twelfth  cen- 
tury. Scholars  and  teachers  from  Paris  had  come  to  Eng- 
land, and  set  up  schools  at  Oxford,  which  soon  became  a 
university  too.  Cambridge  became  a  university  soon  after. 
In  Italy  and  Spain,  too,  the  universities  spread. 

Still,  as  in  the  old  days,  scholars  flocked  to  the  place  where 
a  great  teacher  of  any  subject  could  be  found.  At  Paris  or 
at  Oxford  there  were  not  only  French  or  English  students^ 
but  many  foreigners  as  well.  It  was  not  long  before  the 
Grey  Friars,  as  the  Franciscans  were  called,  and  the  Black 
Friars  too,  were  found  teaching  in  the  universities.  The 
greatest  philosopher  and  teacher  of  the  thirteenth  century 
was  an  Italian   Dominican  friar  called  Thomas  of  Aquino, 


ST.    DOMINIC    BLESSED    BY    ST.    PETER 


264  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

and  now  generally  called  St.  Thomas  Aquinas.  He  wrote 
a  very  wonderful  book  on  philosophy,  and  another  on  theology. 
He  wrote,  too,  some  wonderful  and  beautiful  Latin  hymns. 

The  Franciscans,  too,  were  great  hymn  writers.  An  Italian 
Franciscan,  St.  Bonaventura,  wrote  a  wonderful  Latin  hymn 
called  the  '  Dies  Iree,'  or  the  '  Day  of  Wrath,'  which  is  still 
sung  in  Catholic  churches  to-day. 

Another  great  Franciscan  was  an  Englishman  called  Roger 
Bacon.  The  Franciscans  studied  the  uses  of  herbs  and 
medicines,  to  help  them  to  cure  sick  people,  and  Roger 
Bacon  was  the  first  man  in  the  Middle  Ages  who  said  that 
people  should  try  to  find  out  all  about  the  world  and  things 
in  it  by  making  experiments,  that  is,  doing  things  and  seeing 
what  would  happen,  instead  of  just  believing  the  teaching 
which  was  passed  on  from  one  generation  to  another.  Roger 
Bacon's  way  of  studying  science  has  been  followed  now  for 
many  years,  but  in  his  own  time  his  teaching  seemed  very 
dangerous.  He  was  even  kept  in  prison  for  fourteen  years, 
but  was  let  out  before  he  died. 

There  were  nuns,  too,  belonging  to  both  the  new  orders. 
The  Franciscan  nuns  were  called  'Poor  Clares,'  from  the 
name  of  St.  Clare,  who  was  the  first  woman  to  follow 
St.  Francis.  She  was  only  a  girl  of  seventeen  when  she 
begged  St.  Francis  to  give  her  the  habit  or  frock  of  a 
Franciscan.  She  belonged  to  a  noble  family  of  Assisi,  and 
her  father  was  very  angry,  but  Clare  was  determined  to  lead 
the  life  she  had  chosen.  Her  sister  Agnes  and  many  of  her 
friends  and  relations  joined  her,  and  they  had  their  convent 
at  the  little  church  of  San  Damiano  outside  Assisi,  which 
St.  Francis  had  given  his  father's  money  to  rebuild. 

There  St.  Clare  lived  with  her  nuns  dressed  in  rough  frocks, 
like  the  Friars  Minor  with  bare  feet,  and  there  she  lived  the 
strictest  of  lives.  The  '  Poor  Clares '  lived  always  in  their 
convents,  and  gave  up  all  their  time  to  praying  and  working. 
There  are  many  convents  of  Poor  Clares  still. 

Then,  too,  people  in  the  world  who  were  married  and  had 


ST.  DOMINIC  AND  ST.  FRANCIS  265 

children,  or  for  some  other  reason  could  not  become  monks 
and  nuns,  were  joined  to  these  orders  and  called  '  Tertiaries.' 
They  had  to  live  as  good  lives  as  they  possibly  could,  and  say 
certain  prayers,  and  when  they  died  they  had  the  privilege  of 
being  buried  in  the  habit  of  a  Franciscan  or  a  Dominican, 
according  to  which  order  they  belonged.  So  St.  Dominic  and 
St.  Francis  and  their  friars  played  a  very  important  part  in 
the  lives  of  the  people  in  the  later  Middle  Ages. 

The  Great  Poet  Dante 

There  was  one  other  great  man  born  in  this  century 
whose  name  is  better  known  to  people  to-day  than  even 
those  of  St.  Francis  and  St.  Dominic.  This  was  the  great 
Italian  poet,  Dante.  We  have  seen  how  the  North  Italian 
towns  at  last  made  themselves  practically  free  from  the 
Emperor's  rule  and  governed  themselves.  Venice  became  a 
republic,  governed  by  men  chosen  from  a  few  noble  families. 
Others,  like  Milan,  soon  fell  into  the  hands  of  despots,  and 
were  ruled  by  one  family,  who  passed  on  power  from  father 
to  son  for  many  years. 

The  beautiful  city  of  Florence,  on  the  river  Arno,  was 
at  first  a  democracy.  In  nearly  all  these  cities  there  were 
quarrels  always  going  on  between  different  sides.  Some- 
times one  side  would  be  for  the  Pope  and  the  other  for  the 
Emperor,  and  long  after  the  struggle  between  emperors  and 
popes  was  over,  the  names  of  Ghibellines  and  Guelfs,  as  the 
supporters  of  the  emperors  and  those  of  the  popes  were 
called,  went  on. 

A  little  after  the  middle  of  the  thirteenth  century,  there 
was  born  in  one  of  the  great  families  of  Florence  a  little  boy 
called  Dante  Alighieri.  Dante  grew  up  in  the  beautiful  city 
of  Florence,  and  loved  it  dearly.  He  tells  us  himself  how, 
when  he  was  a  boy  of  nine,  he  met  at  a  children's  party  a 
little  girl  just  a  little  younger  than  himself.  She  was  dressed 
in  a  simple  frock  of  a  beautiful  red  colour,  and  from  the 


266 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


moment  he  saw  her  the  boy  thought  her  the  most  beautiful 
thing  on  earth. 

He  always  loved  her,  but  though  she  grew  to  be  a  woman 
in  Florence,  he  only  met  her  again  once  or  twice.  She 
married  another  Florentine,  and  died  before  she  was  thirty 
years  old,  but  Dante  never  forgot  her,  and  he  wrote  about 
her  afterwards  in  his  wonderful  poetry. 

He  himself  married  a  Florentine  lady,  and  had  four 
children.     He  had  an  important   place  in  the  government 


DANTE    IN    PURGATORY    SEES    THE    VISION    OF    BEATRICE 
(From  a  design  by  the  great  artist  Botticelli  to  illustrate  the  Divine  Comedy,  published  in  1481). 

of  his  city,  but  when  he  was  thirty-five  the  party  to  which 
he  did  not  belong  got  power  in  Florence,  and  Dante  was 
banished  from  the  city  he  loved  so  much.  An  order  was 
given  that  if  he  came  back  he  should  be  burnt  to  death.  His 
wife  stayed  in  Florence,  but  Dante  spent  the  rest  of  his  life 
wandering  from  city  to  city  in  Italy. 

He  was  always  welcomed  and  honoured  by  the  rulers  of 
other  cities,  but  he  was  always  homesick  for  his  own  beloved 
Florence.  At  last  he  was  told  that  he  could  go  back  if  he 
apologized  and  paid  a  fine,  but  he  said  he  would  never  go 


ST.  DOMINIC  AND  ST.  FRANCIS  267 

back  unless  he  was  to  be  received  with  honour.  He  spent 
his  years  of  exile  in  writing  poetry. 

His  great  poem  is  called  the  JDivina  Covimedia  or  the 
Divine  Comedy.  It  was  the  first  great  poem  of  the  Middle 
Ages  written  by  a  poet  in  his  own  language.  Dante,  like  all 
the  scholars  of  the  time,  had  been  trained  in  Latin,  which  was 
the  language  used  by  all  scholars,  and  of  course  the  language 
of  the  Church. 

But  Dante  chose  to  write  in  his  own  beautiful  Italian 
language.  In  the  Divine  Comedy,  Dante  described  the  life 
after  death  as  it  was  imagined  to  be  by  the  men  of  the  Middle 
Ages.  The  great  poem  was  divided  into  three  parts,  describ- 
ing hell  and  the  punishments  of  lost  souls,  purgatory  and  the 
sufferings  of  those  good  people  who  died  before  they  were 
perfect,  and  heaven  and  the  joy  of  good  people  freed  from  all 
stain  of  sin. 

Dante  described  himself  as  passing  in  a  vision  or  dream 
through  all  this,  and  it  is  Beatrice,  grave  and  beautiful,  who 
leads  him  through  the  courts  of  heaven. 

Everything  which  the  great  philosophers  and  theologians 
like  St.  Thomas  Aquinas  taught  about  God  and  religion  is  to 
be  found  described  poetically  in  this  wonderful  poem.  The 
language  itself  is  very  musical  and  beautiful,  and  every  one 
who  really  wants  to  understand  the  Middle  Ages  should  read 
it  through.  Dante  died  at  last  in  Ravenna,  and  was  buried 
there. 

In  later  years  the  Florentines  would  have  given  a  great 
deal  to  have  his  body  buried  in  his  own  city,  but  the  people 
of  Ravenna  would  not  give  it  up.  One  of  Dante's  great 
dreams  was  that  all  Italy  should  be  joined  together  as  one 
nation,  but  that  did  not  come  until  nearly  five  hundred  years 
after  his  time. 


CHAPTER  XXVI 

THE  BLACK  DEATH 

The  men  who  lived  in  the  fourteenth  century  were  different 
in  many  ways  from  those  of  the  thirteenth.  It  was  not  a 
time  of  great  saints.  The  crusades  were  over.  Sometimes  a 
prince  or  noble  would  get  ready  to  go  on  a  new  crusade,  but 
never  went.  There  were  great  kings  in  the  fourteenth 
century,  but  they  were  not  such  splendid  men  as  St.  Louis 
of  France  or  Edward  i.  of  England.  The  great  popes,  too, 
had  passed  away.  They  no  longer  quarrelled  with  the 
emperors  about  ruling  the  whole  world,  for  they  soon  found 
that  they  had  no  real  power  in  ordinary  matters  over  kings 
and  princes,  but  only  in  matters  of  religion. 

For  seventy  years,  indeed,  the  popes  lived  at  Avignon  in 
the  South  of  France  instead  of  at  Rome,  and  were  very  much 
under  the  power  of  the  French  kings.  In  1294  Boniface  viii. 
became  Pope.  He  was  full  of  the  old  ideas  of  Hildebrand  and 
Innocent  iii.  about  the  greatness  of  the  popes.  He  gave  an 
order  that  in  no  country  should  priests  pay  any  sort  of  tax  to 
the  state.  Edward  i.  of  England,  although  he  was  a  good 
and  pious  man,  was  very  angry  at  this,  and  made  the  priests 
pay  their  taxes  all  the  same.  Philip  the  Fair  of  France,  the 
grandson  of  St.  Louis,  was  very  angry  too.  But  Boniface 
took  no  notice. 

The  next  year  he  invited  pilgrims  to  come  from  all  parts 
of  the  world  for  a  great  feast  in  honour  of  the  Apostles. 
People  came  in  thousands  and  thousands,  and  Boniface  was 
delighted.  It  took  two  men  working  all  the  time  to  shovel 
the  offerings  of  money  from  the  tomb  of  St.  Peter. 

268 


THE  BLACK  DEATH  269 

Meanwhile  the  quarrel  between  the  Pope  and  the  French 
king  went  on.  Philip  declared  that  France  was  independent 
of  the  Pope ;  Boniface  replied  by  threatening  to  take  the 
French  throne  from  Philip.  At  last  Philip  sent  some  of  his 
servants  to  attack  Boniface  in  his  palace  at  Anagni,  up  in  the 
mountains  near  Rome.  These  men  burst  into  the  palace, 
threatened  the  Pope,  and  kept  him  prisoner  for  three  days. 
Then  his  Italian  friends  went  to  his  help. 

But  Boniface  had  received  a  dreadful  shock,  and  a  few  days 
after  he  died.  He  understood  at  last  that  the  Pope  was  not 
all-powerful,  and  his  heart  was  broken.  Another  Pope  was 
elected,  but  died  almost  immediately.  People  said  that 
he  was  poisoned  by  some  figs  sent  to  him  by  the  servants 
of  the  French  king.  The  next  Pope  was  a  Frenchman, 
and  it  was  he  who  chose  to  set  up  his  court  at  Avignon, 
a  town  in  the  South  of  France,  but  which  had  been  given  to 
the  Pope. 

For  seventy  years  the  popes  were  Frenchmen  and  lived 
at  Avignon.  The  Italians  and  the  people  of  the  other 
countries  of  Europe  did  not  like  this,  because  it  gave  the 
French  kings  too  much  power  over  the  popes.  People 
mocked  and  said  that  the  Pope  was  really  a  prisoner,  and 
afterwards  this  time  in  the  history  of  the  popes  was  always 
called  the  Babylonish  Captivity,  a  name  taken  from  the 
seventy  years  during  which  the  Jews  had  been  kept  captive 
in  Babylon. 

The  Hundred  Years'  War 

It  seemed  a  very  strange  thing  to  people  in  the  fourteenth 
century  to  have  the  popes  living  at  Avignon,  when  they  had 
lived  at  Rome  during  so  many  hundreds  of  years.  But  many 
other  strange  things  happened  too,  and  there  was  a  great  deal 
of  discontent  and  excitement.  The  English  and  French 
people  began  a  great  war  with  each  other,  which  lasted 
altogether  for  a  hundred  years.  Sometimes  it  would  stop  for 
a  few  years,  but  never  for  very  many.      It  was  called  the 


270 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


*  Hundred  Years'  War.'  It  caused  the  greatest  misery  to 
the  French  people,  and  though  for  many  years  the  English 
won  most  of  the  battles,  it  did  them  no  good  in  the  end. 


In, 


<7i    '/ 


AN    ENGLISH    QUEEN    (ISABELLA,     WIFE     OF    EDWARD     II.)     ENTERING    PARIS    IN    1325 

(From  a  miniature  painting  in  the  famous  History  of  France  and  England  by  Froissart,  now 
in  the  National  Library  at  Paris). 


The  war  was  begun  by  Edward  iii.  of  England,  the  grand- 
son of  Edward  i.  Edward  was  like  his  grandfather  in  many 
ways,  but  he  was  not  such  an  earnest  man.  He  was  a  great 
knight  and  a  good  soldier,  but  the  knights  of  this  time  were 
very  frivolous  and  luxurious.     They  wasted  days  and  weeks  in 


THE  BLACK  DEATH  271 

tournaments,  and  were  very  vain  and  extravagant  in  their 
dress.  They  loved  fighting  for  its  own  sake.  When  his 
uncle  the  king  of  France  died,  Edward  iii.  said  that  he 
ought  to  be  king  because  of  his  mother,  who  was  the  sister  of 
the  king.  In  France  women  could  not  inherit  the  crown, 
and  in  any  case  there  were  other  women  with  a  better  right 
than  Edward's  mother.  But  Edward  really  wanted  an  excuse 
for  fighting  the  French. 

There  were  many  reasons  for  the  French  and  English 
disagreeing  at  the  time.  Ever  since  the  days  of  Henry  ii. 
the  English  kings  had  had  land  in  the  South  of  France, 
and  the  French  kings  were  always  trying  to  win  it  from 
them.  Then,  too,  the  French  and  the  English  were  both 
building  more  ships,  and  the  sailors  of  the  two  nations  often 
quarrelled  on  the  seas. 

The  first  great  fight  of  the  Hundred  Years'  War  was 
between  the  French  and  English  fleets,  and  the  English  won. 
After  this  the  English  were  always  greater  at  sea  than 
the  French.  Edward's  way  of  fighting  the  French  was  to 
land  in  the  north  of  the  country,  and  march  along  burning 
every  village  he  came  to.  If  a  French  army  faced  him  he 
would  fight  it,  win  a  victory,  march  on,  and  then  come  home. 
But  he  never  really  made  any  use  of  his  victories.  Perhaps 
he  knew  that  he  had  no  real  chance  of  winning  France. 

His  greatest  victory  of  all  was  at  the  battle  of  Crecy 
in  1347.  This  was  won  by  the  English  archers,  who  fought 
on  foot.  These  archers  were  men  of  the  middle  and  poorer 
classes  of  Englishmen,  and  there  were  always  a  good  many 
in  Edward's  armies.  The  French  armies  were  chiefly  made 
up  of  knights  who  fought  on  horseback.  The  archers  were 
men  from  Genoa  in  Italy,  who  fought  with  old-fashioned 
'  crossbows,' while  the  English  used  the  'long  bow.'  When 
the  English  archers  shot  at  the  French  horses  and  knights, 
these  were  immediately  thrown  into  disorder.  Often  the 
ground  was  soft  and  swampy,  and  the  horses  could  hardly 
get  along. 


272  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

As  the  years  went  on  nearly  all  the  fighting  in  France 
was  done  by  Edward's  eldest  son,  the  Black  Prince.  He 
led  great  armies,  burning  and  destroying,  through  the  South 
of  France,  causing  the  greatest  misery  to  the  people.  In 
1356  he  won  the  great  battle  of  Poitiers,  and  took  the  French 
king  prisoner.  The  prince  waited  on  the  king  at  table,  and 
treated  him  with  the  greatest  respect. 

The  knights  of  the  fourteenth  century  were  always  care- 
ful about  these  things,  yet  they  could  be  terribly  cruel.  The 
Black  Prince  himself  burned  the  town  of  Limoges  to  the 
ground,  and  had  all  its  people  killed  because  they  had  offended 
him.  King  John  was  carried  to  England,  but  allowed  to  go 
back  to  France  to  try  to  collect  his  ransom ;  but  France 
was  miserably  poor  through  the  war,  and  he  could  not  get 
enough  money.  So  he  went  back  to  England  again,  and 
died  a  prisoner. 

In  the  year  1360  peace  was  made  between  England 
and  France.  The  English  king  gave  up  his  claim  to  the 
French  throne,  but  was  given  the  Duchy  of  Acquitaine, 
which  covered  nearly  half  of  the  South  of  France.  For  the 
next  ten  years  there  was  peace.  Edward  iii.  was  now 
growing  old,  but  the  Black  Prince  died  the  year  before  him, 
in  1376.  Before  he  died  nearly  all  of  Acquitaine  had  been 
won  back  by  France. 

Edward  iii.  had  grown  very  weak  and  foolish  in  his  old 
age.  He  had  never  been  a  very  good  man,  and  in  his  old  age 
he  gathered  round  him  wicked  men  and  women.  One  woman 
stole  the  rings  from  his  fingers  as  he  lay  dying,  and  left  the 
old  king  to  die  alone.  It  is  hard  to  believe  that  this  was 
the  same  king  who  had  been  so  gay  and  merry  a  few  years 
before.  It  was  Edward  iii.  who  set  up  the  '  Order  of  the 
Garter.'  It  became  the  greatest  honour  to  be  made  a 
Knight  of  the  Garter,  and  it  still  is.  Yet  the  beginnings 
of  the  Order  were  very  peculiar.  Once  at  a  ball  at  the 
court  of  Edward  iii.  somebody  picked  up  a  garter,  and 
Edward  immediately   said    he   would    set   up    an   Order   of 


CD   o   a 

OJ      P      D 


t^  1;;  ^ 


o      f 

P 
O 

H 


iJ)    ^    [fi 

0^2 


T)     >,    td 


^      Cl 


SO    o 


THE  BLACK  DEATH  273 

Knights,  who  should  wear  a  garter  on  the  left  leg  as  their 
special  badge. 

It  is  sometimes  said  that  Edward  set  up  the  Order 
of  the  Garter  in  honour  of  the  taking  of  the  French  town 
of  Calais  by  the  English,  at  the  beginning  of  the  Hundred 
Years'  War.  The  English  had  been  besieging  this  town  for 
many  months,  when  at  last  it  sent  to  ask  for  mercy  from 
the  king.  Edward,  who  was  very  angry,  said  he  would  only 
let  the  people  of  Calais  go  free  from  punishment  if  they 
gave  their  city  up,  and  also  sent  to  him  six  of  their  chief  men 
dressed  only  in  shirts  with  ropes  round  their  necks,  and  the 
keys  of  the  city  in  their  hands,  and  he  would  do  what  he 
liked  with  them.  Six  of  the  chief  men  of  Calais  offered  to 
do  this,  and  came  before  Edward  and  his  Queen  Philippa. 
But  the  good  queen  was  full  of  pity  for  them,  fell  on  her 
knees  crying,  and  begged  the  king  to  let  them  go  free,  and  so 
he  did. 

When  Edward  iii.  died,  his  young  grandson,  the  son  of 
the  Black  Prince,  became  king  of  England.  He  was  called 
Richard  ii.  He  was  only  a  boy  of  sixteen  when  a  great 
rebellion  of  the  poor  people  of  England  broke  out.  It  was 
called  the  Peasants'  Revolt.  The  peasants  in  different  parts 
of  England  rose  in  revolt  against  the  rich  owners  of  the  land. 
Often  they  took  scythes  and  other  things  with  which  they 
worked  on  the  land  for  weapons.  The  peasants  of  Kent  had 
for  their  leader  a  man  called  Wat  Tyler.  He  persuaded  them 
to  march  to  London,  so  that  they  could  tell  the  king  their 
troubles.  When  they  got  to  London  the  boy  king  rode  to 
meet  them,  and  promised  to  try  to  make  things  better  for 
them.  But  Wat  Tyler,  who  must  have  been  a  bad  man,  led 
his  men  into  the  city,  and  they  burned  houses  and  killed 
every  servant  of  the  king  they  could  find. 

The  next  day  Richard  rode  out  to  meet  them  again.  He 
was  a  tall,  slim,  handsome  boy,  and  looked  very  brave  and 
noble  as  he  faced  the  peasants.  Wat  Tyler  rode  up  to  speak 
to  the  king,  but  he  looked  as  though  he  was  going  to  strike 


274  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

him,  and  the  mayor  of  London,  who  was  with  the  king,  drew 
his  dagger  and  stabbed  him  to  the  heart.  He  fell  dead,  and 
the  mayor  was  afraid  that  the  peasants  would  attack  the  king, 
but  Richard  rode  bravely  up  to  them,  and  talked  to  them, 
while  the  mayor  rode  off  and  brought  some  soldiers  to  protect 
the  king.  The  peasants,  now  that  their  leader  was  dead,  went 
back  to  their  homes  again.  The  thing  that  they  had  com- 
plained about  was  a  tax  which  the  king  had  tried  to  collect 
from  them.  They  said  they  were  too  poor  to  pay  it.  They 
had  other  troubles  too. 

Three  times  during  the  fourteenth  century  a  terrible 
plague  of  sickness  called  the  Black  Death  had  spread  over 
the  countries  of  Europe  from  the  East.  People  died  in 
hundreds.  Half  the  people  in  England  altogether  died  of 
it,  and  especially  the  poorer  people.  In  those  days  there 
were  not,  of  course,  nearly  so  many  people  in  any  country 
as  there  are  to-day.  In  the  whole  of  England  there  were  not 
as  many  people  as  there  are  now  in  London.  After  the 
Black  Death  the  rich  landowners  found  that  there  were  not 
so  many  men  as  before  to  cut  the  corn  and  work  on  the  land. 
Sometimes  whole  fields  of  corn  had  to  be  left  to  go  bad 
because  there  were  no  labourers  to  cut  it.  Then  the  labourers 
seeing  that,  asked  for  more  wages. 

In  the  early  days  after  the  Norman  Conquest,  the 
labourers  had  not  had  money  wages,  but  had  had  small 
pieces  of  land  for  themselves,  and  were  bound  to  work 
several  days  each  week  on  the  land  of  their  lord.  They 
were  serfs.  But  for  many  years  the  lords  had  been  letting 
the  serfs  go  free,  and  were  paying  wages  to  labourers.  Now 
some  of  them  wanted  to  make  the  labourers  serfs  again. 

Altogether  the  lords,  and  the  labourers  too,  were  very 
discontented  with  the  changes  caused  by  the  terrible  Black 
Death,  and  it  was  really  this  which  brought  about  the 
Peasants'  Revolt.  There  were  even  some  people  who  said,  as 
people  called  socialists  say  now,  that  there  should  not  be  rich 
people  and  poor  people,  but  that  all  should  be  equal.     One 


THE  BLACK  DEATH 


275 


man,  who  was  a  priest  and  named  John  Ball,  went  about  the 
country  saying — 


'  When  Adam  delved  and  Eve  span 
Who  was  then  the  gentleman  ? ' 


He  was  called  the  mad  priest  of  Kent.     Another  of  these 


AGRICULTURAL    LIFE    IN    THE    FOURTEENTH    CENTURY 

(From  a  wonderful  series  of  drawings  made  about  1340  in  an  English  book  of  prayers  called  the 

Luttrell  Psalter.     In  the  first  picture  two  men  thresh  corn  with  flails  ;    in  the  second  an  old 

woman  brings  her  corn  to  the  miller  to  be  ground  ;  in  the  last  labourers  stack  the  sheaves  of 

corn.     The  drawings  show  very  clearly  how  farm  people  dressed  in  the  fourteenth  century). 


preachers  was  called  Jack  Straw,  and  another  Grindcob. 
They  were  all  taken  and  hanged  before  the  end  of  the 
Peasants'  Revolt. 

Some  people  said,  too,  that  the  peasants  were  encouraged 
by   another  priest,   named  John   WyclifF,   but  he   had   not 


276  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

really  anything  to  do  with  the  revolt,  except  that  he  taught 
that  priests  should  be  poor,  and  that  the  Church  in  Eng- 
land was  too  rich,  and  sent  out  priests  of  this  kind  to 
preach  to  the  people.  John  WyclifF  was  a  teacher  at  Oxford, 
and  a  very  clever  man.  Besides  teaching  that  the  Church 
should  be  poor,  he  said,  too,  that  the  bread  and  wine  which 
the  Church  taught  were  changed  into  the  Body  and  Blood  of 
Christ  in  the  Mass,  were  not  really  changed. 

This  was  heresy,  and  WyclifF  was  taken  before  the  arch- 
bishop of  Canterbury  to  be  examined  on  these  things.  He 
either  denied  that  he  had  said  them  or  explained  them  in 
some  way  to  which  the  archbishop  agreed,  and  so  Wycliff 
went  back  safely  to  his  church  at  Lutterworth,  where  he 
lived  for  some  years  saying  Mass  and  working  as  a  priest, 
and  then  died. 

But  for  many  years  there  were  men  who  went  on  teach- 
ing these  heresies  of  WyclifF.  They  were  called  Lollards,  and 
some  of  them  were  burnt  to  death  in  the  fifteenth  century. 

After  the  Peasants'  Revolt  people  settled  down  again, 
and  as  time  went  on  the  quarrel  between  the  landowners 
and  the  labourers  died  out.  By  the  end  of  the  Middle  Ages 
all  the  serfs  in  England  were  free,  and  all  the  men  who 
worked  on  the  landowners'  farms  were  labourers  who  were 
paid  with  money. 

In  France,  too,  during  the  wars  of  Edward  iii.,  there  had 
been  much  discontent  among  the  peasants.  When  King  John 
of  France  was  a  prisoner  in  England,  a  terrible  rebellion  of 
the  peasants  broke  out,  which  was  called  the  '  Jacquerie,'  as 
*  Jacques  '  or '  James '  was  an  ordinary  peasant  name  in  France. 
The  soldiers,  who  had  no  more  fighting  to  do  after  the  battle 
of  Poitiers,  went  about  stealing  from  the  people. 

The  nobles  who  had  been  taken  prisoners  by  the  English 
made  the  people  on  their  lands  pay  a  great  deal  of  money 
towards  their  ransom,  and  the  French  peasants  had  sufFered 
from  the  terrible  Black  Death  too.  The  French  parlia- 
ment, which  was  called  the  States- General,  had  very  little 


THE  BLACK  DEATH  277 

power  in  France,  and  now  they  tried  to  get  more,  think- 
ing they  could  help  to  make  things  better  for  the  people. 

The  dauphin,  as  the  French  king's  eldest  son  was  always 
called,  made  promises  which  he  did  not  mean  to  keep,  and 
one  of  the  chief  men  in  Paris,  called  Etienne  Marcel,  got 
the  people  of  Paris  to  attack  the  nobles  of  the  court.  Marcel 
himself  forced  his  way  into  the  palace,  and  killed  two  of  the 
greatest  men  of  the  court. 

Then  all  over  France  the  peasants  rose.  The  feudal  castles 
were  burnt,  and  great  numbers  of  the  nobles  and  their  wives 
were  killed.  The  French  peasants  had  always  been  much 
more  badly  treated  by  their  lords  than  the  English,  and  now 
they  took  a  terrible  revenge.  The  dauphin's  wife  and  her 
ladies  had  shut  themselves  up  in  the  town  of  Meaux,  and  an 
angry  crowd  of  peasants  were  attacking  it  when  they  were 
attacked  themselves  by  Gaston  Phoebus,  Count  of  Foix,  and 
his  friends.  He  fought  heroically,  and  the  serfs  were  scat- 
tered. After  this  they  lost  heart,  and  they  were  dreadfully 
punished,  hunted  down  like  wild  beasts,  and  killed  in  thou- 
sands. The  Jacquerie  in  France  was  a  far  more  terrible  thing 
than  even  the  Peasants'  Revolt  in  England. 

The  First  Great  English  Poet 

Yet  though  the  story  of  the  fourteenth  century  seems  a 
sad  one  in  many  ways,  it  was  the  time  when  the  first  great 
English  poet,  Geoffrey  Chaucer,  lived  and  wrote.  By  this 
time  there  were  French  poets  writing  in  French.  In  Italy 
Petrarch  had  followed  in  the  steps  of  Dante,  and  written 
poems  in  the  beautiful  language  of  Tuscany,  the  part  of 
Italy  round  Florence.  Petrarch's  best  poems  are  his  sonnets, 
in  honour  of  Madonna  Laura,  a  lady  whom  he  loved,  and 
who  died  of  the  plague  in  1348. 

In  England,  at  the  end  of  the  thirteenth  century,  some 
of  the  chroniclers  of  the  monasteries  had  begun  to  write  in 
English   instead   of   Latin.     In   the   next    century   WyclifF 


278  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

wrote  his  opinions  in  English,  and  also  translated  part  of 
the  Bible  into  English.  The  poem  called  the  'Vision  of 
Piers  Plowman'  was  written  in  English  too,  but  Chaucer 
wrote  the  best  poetry  of  all. 

He  was  born  in  London,  and  was  the  son  of  a  wine- 
merchant.  He  himself  had  work  at  the  court  of  Edward  iii. 
and  Richard  ii.,  and  it  was  for  the  lords  and  ladies  of  the 
court  that  he  wrote.  But  he  wrote  about  what  he  saw 
around  him,  and  his  poetry,  which  is  very  musical  and 
beautiful,  is  full  of  fun  too.  His  chief  work  was  the 
'  Canterbury  Tales,'  in  which  Chaucer  described  a  number 
of  pilgrims  on  their  way  to  the  tomb  of  St.  Thomas  Becket 
at  Canterbury.  He  makes  each  of  them  tell  a  tale.  By 
reading  these  poems  we  can  get  a  true  idea  of  what  life  in 
England  was  like  in  Chaucer's  time,  and  at  the  same  time 
enjoy  the  first  beautiful  poetry  written  in  English. 


CHAPTER  XXVII 

THE  END  OF  THE  MIDDLE  AGES 

After  the  popes  had  been  at  Avignon  nearly  sixty  years, 
Pope  Urban  v.  made  up  his  mind  to  go  back  to  Rome. 
While  the  popes  had  been  away,  Rome  had  become  very 
poor  and  miserable.  The  houses  in  the  outer  parts  of  the 
city  were  left  empty,  and  the  people  crowded  to  the  centre 
of  the  town. 

One  or  two  of  the  great  noble  families  got  all  power 
over  the  city  until  Rienzi,  a  young  Roman,  the  son  of  a 
hotelkeeper  and  a  washerwoman,  persuaded  the  people  to 
try  to  set  up  again  the  old  Roman  republic.  He  really 
made  himself  head  of  the  city,  and  sent  messengers  to  the 
other  Italian  cities  to  ask  them  to  put  themselves  under  the 
leadership  of  Rome.  Two  princes  in  Germany  were  fighting 
as  to  which  of  them  was  really  emperor.  He  ordered  them 
to  let  him  judge  between  them.  At  first  the  people  admired 
Rienzi  and  treated  him  as  a  hero.  He  lived  in  the  greatest 
luxury,  and  was  full  of  wild  plans.  But  at  last  the  people 
turned  against  him,  and  an  angry  crowd  surrounded  his 
palace.  He  tried  to  escape,  dressed  like  a  poor  man,  but  the 
people  recognized  him  and  killed  him  immediately. 

After  this  there  was  still  much  misery  and  disorder,  and 
the  Romans  were  delighted  when  Pope  Urban  v.  came  back 
to  Rome.  All  the  best  people  of  the  time  were  glad.  The 
poet  Petrarch,  and  St.  Brigit  of  Sweden,  and  many  others 
had  begged  the  Pope  to  return  to  the  city  of  St.  Peter. 
But  Urban  v.  soon  went  back  to  Avignon.  He  was  per- 
suaded to  do  so  by  the  French  cardinals,  who  loved  Avignon, 

279 


280 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


where  the  popes  had  a  splendid  court  and  lived  very  magni- 
ficently ;  but  at  last,  in  the  year  1377,  Pope  Gregory  ix.  left 
Avignon  and  went  back  to  Rome,  where  the  popes  have 
remained  ever  since. 

The  person  who  did  most  to  persuade  the  Pope  to  go  back 
was  St.  Catherine  of  Siena.     Catherine  was  the  youngest  of 

the  twenty-five  children  of  a  dyer 
who  lived  in  Siena,  one  of  the 
beautiful  towns  of  North  Italy. 
When  she  was  only  seven  years  old, 
Catherine  made  up  her  mind  never 
to  marry,  but  to  give  all  her  time 
and  strength  to  religion.  When  she 
was  only  a  young  girl  about  seven- 
teen, she  became  a  Dominican 
tertiary,  and  for  a  time  lived  very 
quietly  by  herself.  But  when  her 
father  died  she  went  back  to  take 
care  of  her  mother,  and  ever  after- 
wards she  was  surrounded  by  friends, 
whom  she  was  always  helping. 

Great  statesmen  all  over  Europe 

took   her   advice,  for  she  was  very 

wise  as  well  as  good.     She  wrote  the 

most    beautiful    letters    in     Italian 

which  was  just  as  beautiful  as  that 

written   by   Petrarch    himself.      St. 

Catherine    wrote    to    persuade    the 

Pope  to  go  back  to  Rome,  and  went  there  herself  to  help 

to  receive   him.      It  was  a  very  wonderful  thing  that    the 

great  men  of  the  time  took  the  advice  of  a  woman. 

Everywhere  she  went  a  little  band  of  men  and  women, 
some  of  the  cleverest  and  best  of  the  time,  went  with  her. 
And  though  St.  Catherine  was  a  strong  and  firm  character 
there  was  nothing  unwomanly  about  her.  She  was  full  of 
sorrow  for    other    people's   troubles.       Once   she   spent  the 


ST.    CATHERINE    OF    SIENA 

(From  a  fourteenth-century  paintin: 
of  the  saint  and  a  nun). 


THE  END  OF  THE  MIDDLE  AGES         281 

whole  night  with  a  young  man  who  had  committed  a  crime 
and  was  condemned  to  die.  She  consoled  him  like  a  mother, 
allowing  him  to  rest  his  head  on  her  breast,  and  soothing  him 
and  helping  him  to  meet  death  bravely. 

St.  Catherine  and  all  the  Italians  were  delighted  to  have 
the  Pope  back  in  Rome,  but  new  troubles  soon  arose. 
Gregory  ix.  died,  and  the  cardinals  elected  another  Pope. 
But  the  French  cardinals  said  they  would  not  have  him, 
and  elected  an  anti-pope  of  their  own.  The  Pope  elected  at 
Rome  was,  of  course,  the  real  Pope,  but  a  great  many  people 
pretended  to  believe  that  the  anti-pope  was  the  true  Pope. 
Every  one  who  was  friendly  to  France  did  this,  while  the 
English,  who  were  always  the  enemies  of  France,  sided  with 
the  true  Pope.  At  last  the  confusion  was  so  great  that  it 
was  agreed  to  call  a  general  council,  a  meeting  of  bishops 
from  all  parts,  to  settle  the  question.  This  council  met  at 
Pisa,  and  chose  a  new  Pope,  but  neither  of  the  other  Popes 
would  give  in,  and  so  things  were  now  worse  than  ever. 

A  few  years  afterwards  the  Emperor  Sigismund  called 
another  council  at  Constance.  At  this  council  the  real  Pope 
resigned  and  the  other  two  were  deposed,  and  then  at  last  the 
cardinals  elected  Pope  Martin  v.  Everybody  agreed  to  take 
him  as  Pope,  and  so  the  'Great  Schism,'  as  it  was  called,  ended. 
But  all  this  trouble  and  disorder  had  made  people  think  less 
of  the  popes,  and  a  new  spirit  arose  of  disrespect  and  criticism, 
which  made  it  easier  for  the  men  in  the  next  century  who 
said  that  the  Pope  was  not  head  even  in  religious  things,  as 
every  one  in  the  Middle  Ages  believed. 

Already  there  were  men  who  refused  to  believe  what  the 
Church  and  the  Pope  taught.  In  the  kingdom  of  Bohemia, 
in  the  east  of  Germany,  there  were  men  who  were  still 
teaching  the  things  that  Wycliff  had  taught  in  England. 
Like  WyclifF,  they  were  educated  men,  not  ignorant  people 
like  the  Albigensians  and  most  of  the  heretics  of  the  earlier 
Middle  Ages. 

They  knew  how  to  write  and  argue  about  their  opinions. 


282 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


and   so   they   were   very   dangerous   to   the   Church.      The 
chief  of  these  new  heretics   in  Bohemia  was   a  teacher  in 

the  University  of  Prague,  the 
capital  of  that  country.  His 
name  was  John  Huss.  The 
Council  of  Constance  was 
anxious  to  bring  order  into 
the  Church,  as  well  as  to 
settle  the  question  about  the 
popes,  and  John  Huss  was 
called  before  it  to  give  an 
account  of  his  teaching.  The 
Emperor  Sigismund  gave  him 
a  safe  -  conduct,  that  is,  a 
promise  that  he  could  come 
and  go  safely.  But  Sigismund 
broke  his  promise. 

The  council  treated  Huss 
in  a  very  rough  and  angry 
manner.  Things  which  he 
had  written  in  his  books  were 
read  out,  and  he  was  com- 
manded to  agree  that  they 
were  heresies.  But  he  would 
not.  For  a  month  Huss 
was  kept  in  prison,  while  the 
bishops  tried  to  persuade  him 
to  give  in.     Every  one  knew 

In  the  top  picture  Huss  is  being  degraded  as  a  ^^^^^.  \^q  ^^g  ^   frQod    aud    holv 
heretic  by  having  his  priest's  robes  removed ;  in  "  .  •' 

the  lower  he  is  being  led  to  the  stake  clothed  as  man,  but  the  COUUCil  thoUght 

a  heretic.     (From  drawings  in  an  account  of  1417  ^r^    a.  i       tjUonlfJ    mvp  in    to    the 

of  the  Council  of  Constance).  ^"^^  "^  SUOUIQ  glVC  lU   lO    tnC 

Church.     At  last,  in  spite  of 
the  Emperor's  promise,  they  said  he  must  die. 

When  he  was  tied  to  the  stake  with  the  wood  piled  up 
round  him  ready  to  burn,  he  was  again  begged  to  give  in,  but 
he  answered  that  he  had  taught  what  he  thought  right  and 


JOHN    HUSS    CONDEMNED    AND    LED    TO 
EXECUTION 


THE  END  OF  THE  MIDDLE  AGES  283 

that  he  died  joyfully.  Then  he  was  burnt  and  his  ashes 
were  thrown  into  the  Rhine.  His  great  friend,  Jerome  of 
Prague,  was  burnt  soon  afterwards. 

But  in  Bohemia  their  followers  still  went  on  with  their 
teaching.  Even  when  Sigismund  led  a  crusade  against 
them,  the  Bohemians,  under  their  leader  John  Zizka,  fought 
desperately.  Zizka  was  really  a  very  terrible  man  in  spite  of 
his  courage.  He  was  blinded  first  in  one  eye  and  then  in  the 
other  in  two  different  battles.  But  he  would  get  his  officers 
to  tell  him  all  about  the  land  where  a  battle  was  to  be  fought, 
and  then  would  tell  them  how  to  arrange  the  army.  But 
he  was  terribly  cruel.  His  enemies  told  a  tale  of  how  once 
he  fastened  several  priests  up  in  barrels  and  then  had  them 
covered  with  tar  and  set  on  fire.  When  he  heard  the  shrieks 
of  the  priests  dying  in  dreadful  agony  he  said,  '  Listen  to 
the  bridal  song.' 

In  the  end,  after  Zizka's  peace  was  made,  the  Hussites 
got  their  own  way  about  most  of  the  things  for  which 
they  had  fought.  The  Hussites  always  declared  that  they 
belonged  to  the  Catholic  Church,  but  they  were  in  many 
ways  very  like  the  Protestants  of  the  sixteenth  century. 
In  the  Middle  Ages  no  one  had  been  sorry  for  heretics  when 
they  were  burnt,  but  there  were  many  people  now  who  were 
sorry  for  John  Huss  and  his  friend,  and  this  was  a  sign  that 
things  would  soon  change. 

Meanwhile  England  and  France  had  begun  the  second 
part  of  the  Hundred  Years'  War.  Richard  ii.  of  England, 
the  brave  young  king  who  had  faced  the  peasants  in  the 
Peasants'  Revolt,  married  a  little  French  princess,  and  had 
made  a  truce  with  France.  But  Richard  ii.  ruled  England 
badly  in  the  end,  and  was  deposed  and  probably  murdered 
in  prison  by  Henry,  Earl  of  Richmond,  who  was  called 
King  Henry  iv. 

During  Henry  iv.'s  reign  two  great  parties  began  to  quarrel 
in  France,  and  while  Henry  iv.  was  ill,  his  young  son,  who 
was  also  called  Henry  and  afterwards  became  Henry  v.,  sent 


284  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

help  to  the  party  of  the  duke  of  Burgundy,  who  were  called 
the  Burgundians,  while  the  side  they  fought  against  were 
called  the  Armagnacs.  Henry  iv.  died  soon  afterwards.  He 
had  never  been  a  happy  king.  It  seemed  as  though  he  could 
never  forget  his  cruelty  to  the  handsome  and  unhappy 
Richard  ii.  People  had  never  really  loved  him,  but  his  son 
Henry  v.  was  loved  by  every  one. 

He  was  a  very  brave  man  and  very  religious.  He 
seems  to  have  believed  that  he  really  had  a  right  to  the 
crown  of  France,  and  at  the  very  beginning  of  his  reign 
he  made  up  his  mind  to  try  to  win  it.  The  king  of  France 
at  that  time  was  mad.  He  was  called  Charles  vi.  His 
son,  the  dauphin,  was  friendly  with  the  party  of  the 
Armagnacs,  and  the  people  of  the  South  of  France  liked 
them  best.  But  Paris  and  the  North  of  France  preferred 
the  Burgundians. 

In  the  year  1415  Henry  v.  sailed  with  a  great  army 
to  France.  He  marched  through  the  north  of  the  country, 
until  he  was  faced  by  a  great  French  army  near  the  village 
of  Agincourt.  Here  the  famous  battle  of  Agincourt  was 
fought.  All  during  the  night  before  the  battle,  the  French 
soldiers  drank  and  played  while  the  English  slept  or  prayed. 
In  the  morning  Henry  stood  before  the  army  with  his 
jewelled  crown  on  top  of  his  helmet  and  spoke  to  his  soldiers. 
Then  he  knelt  down  before  them  all  and  prayed  aloud  for 
victory. 

The  English  army  still  had  many  archers,  while  the 
French  still  went  on  using  great  numbers  of  horse-soldiers, 
as  in  the  battles  of  the  first  part  of  the  Hundred  Years' 
War.  King  Henry  put  a  long  row  of  stakes  in  front  of 
his  army,  wide  enough  apart  for  the  archers  to  pass  between. 
Then  they  went  forward,  and  shot  a  great  shower  of  arrows 
into  the  French  army,  and  ran  quickly  back  again.  Then 
the  French  horsemen  dashed  forward,  but  could  not  pass 
between  the  stakes.  Those  at  the  back  crowded  on  to  the 
front  lines.      The   horses   sank    into    the   soft   ground  and 


THE  END  OF  THE  MIDDLE  AGES         285 

there  was  the  greatest  confusion,  while  the  English  archers 
killed  hundreds  of  men  and  horses  with  shower  after  shower 
of  arrows.  Once  again  it  was  seen  how  the  ordinary  English- 
men could  defeat  the  great  feudal  lords  of  France.  After 
the  victory  Henry  sailed  back  to  England. 

The  people  were  so  delighted  and  proud  that  at  Dover  they 
could  not  wait  for  the  ships  to  come  to  the  shore,  but  dashed 
into  the  sea  as  far  as  their  waists  to  meet  the  king.  In 
London  the  people  went  nearly  mad  with  joy ;  all  the  church 
bells  rang  merrily  as  Henry  rode  to  St.  Paul's  to  give  thanks 
for  his  victory.  Soon  Henry  went  back  to  France  and  won 
victory  after  victory,  and  at  last  in  1420  the  French  king  and 
queen  were  persuaded  to  sign  the  Treaty  of  Troyes.  Henry 
was  to  marry  Katharine,  their  daughter,  and  he  was  to  be 
king  of  France  when  the  mad  king  died.  The  whole  of  the 
North  of  France  agreed  to  this,  but  the  dauphin  would  not 
give  up  his  rights,  and  the  South  of  France  took  his  side. 
Henry  was  fighting  on  the  river  Loire  when  he  died,  at  the 
age  of  thirty -five  years. 

The  English  people  have  always  thought  of  him  as  a  hero, 
but  after  all  he  had  no  right  to  France.  His  wife,  Katharine, 
had  had  a  baby  son,  who  became  king  of  England,  and  was 
called  Henry  vi.  For  many  years  his  uncles  went  on  fighting 
in  France  for  him,  but  the  English  never  fought  so  well  when 
Henry  v.  was  dead. 

Joan  of  Arc 

And  now  a  very  wonderful  thing  happened  which  saved 
France  from  the  English.  Three  years  before  the  battle  of 
Agincourt  there  was  born  in  the  village  of  Domremy  in 
France  a  little  peasant  girl  named  Joan.  She  was  brought 
up  like  other  little  peasants  to  say  her  prayers  and  do  her 
sewing,  and  help  to  look  after  her  father's  sheep. 

But  from  the  first  Joan  was  not  quite  like  other  little 
girls.  She  was  merry  and  good-tempered,  but  often,  while 
the   other  village  children  were  playing  their  games,  Joan 


286  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

would  go  quietly  away  into  the  woods  near  her  home,  to  say 
her  prayers  all  by  herself.  All  the  time  she  was  growing  up 
she  heard  stories  of  the  terrible  sufferings  of  the  French 
people  through  the  dreadful  wars  with  the  English.  Always 
she  was  full  of  pity,  as  she  said,  'for  the  fair  kingdom  of 
France.' 

Then  while  she  was  praying  in  the  woods  she  thought  she 
heard  voices  telling  her  to  be  very  good,  and  that  she  had 
been  chosen  to  save  France  from  her  enemies.  Then  she 
thought  that  St.  Michael  and  St.  Catherine  appeared  to  her. 
Joan  felt  very  frightened  at  the  thought  that  a  poor  girl  like 
her  had  to  do  these  great  things,  but  at  last  she  made  up  her 
mind  that  she  could  not  refuse.  Very  seriously  she  told  her 
friends  about  her  voices,  and  begged  to  be  taken  to  the  king. 
'  It  was  for  this  that  I  was  born,'  she  said  gently  and  rather 
sadly. 

At  last  her  uncle  took  her  to  the  governor  of  a  town  near, 
and  when  he  heard  her  story,  it  was  settled  that  she  should 
be  taken  to  the  king. 

For  eleven  days  she  travelled  to  reach  the  court.  The 
nobles  had  heard  of  her  coming,  and  some  of  them  were 
inclined  to  make  fun  of  the  poor  peasant  girl.  The  mad 
king  was  now  dead,  and  it  was  the  dauphin,  who  became 
Charles  vii.  of  France,  who  was  now  the  rightful  king  of 
France. 

Charles  was  plainly  dressed,  and  stood  among  a  little 
crowd  of  his  courtiers  as  Joan  went  into  the  room  where 
he  was.  There  was  nothing  to  show  that  he  was  king,  but 
Joan  went  up  to  him  at  once,  and  fell  on  her  knees  before 
him,  saying :  '  I  am  sent  to  you  by  the  King  of  Heaven  to 
tell  you  that  you  shall  be  crowned  king  of  France.'  Even  the 
mocking  courtiers  began  to  think  that  the  '  Maid,'  as  she  was 
soon  called  by  every  one,  had  been  really  sent  by  God  to  save 
France. 

The  English  were  then  besieging  the  great  town  of  Orleans 
on  the  river  Loire.     If  only  they  could  take  it,  they  thought 


THE  END  OF  THE  MIDDLE  AGES  287 

they  would  be  able  to  win  the  South  of  France,  as  well  as  the 
North,  for  the  young  Henry  vi.  The  king  said  Joan  could 
lead  the  army  against  the  English.  She  was  given  a  suit  of 
white  armour  to  wear,  and  a  beautiful  white  horse  to  ride  on, 
and  she  carried  a  beautiful  white  banner  with  the  lilies  of 
France  embroidered  on  one  side  and  the  Face  of  God  with 
angels  kneeling  before  Him  on  the  other. 


JOAN  OF  ARC  COMES  TO  THE  COURT  OF  THE  FRENCH  KING 

(From  an  ancient  tapestry  at  Orleans,  the  only  representation  of  Joan  which  is 
contemporary  with  her). 

The  French  soldiers  were  full  of  love  and  respect  for  Joan, 
and  followed  her  gladly.  When  they  reached  Orleans  nearly 
all  the  forts  round  the  city  had  been  taken  by  the  English, 
but  Joan  soon  won  them  back.  She  was  wounded  on  the 
first  day,  but  rode  on  just  the  same. 

The  French  soldiers  knew  that  she  was  a  saint,  but  the 
English  said  she  was  a  witch.  They  were  frightened  of  her, 
and  this  made  it  easier  for  Joan  to  win.  The  English  in  the 
end  fled  away  from  Orleans,  and  the  town  was  saved.  Then 
Joan  begged  the  dauphin  to  go  with  her  to  Rheims  and  be 


288  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

crowned,  for  in  the  cathedral  there  the  French  kings  were 
always  crowned.  And  so  he  did.  Joan  knelt  in  the  cathedral 
full  of  happiness,  for  now  that  the  king  was  crowned  she  knew 
her  work  was  over.  Her  voices  had  told  her  to  save  Orleans, 
and  to  take  the  king  to  be  crowned  at  Rheims.  Now  that  this 
was  done  she  was  ready  to  go  back  and  look  after  her  father's 
sheep  once  more. 

But  the  king  would  not  let  her,  and  his  officers,  who  did 
not  like  Joan  and  hated  that  she  should  have  the  command 
of  the  army,  did  not  want  her  to  go  either  because  she  was 
too  useful.  They  made  her  lead  the  armies  against  the 
English  in  the  North  of  France,  but  she  had  no  longer  any 
belief  that  she  was  doing  God's  will.  At  last  she  was  taken 
prisoner  by  the  English,  and  was  given  up  by  them  to  the 
bishop  of  Rouen,  who  was  a  Frenchman  but  on  the  English 
side. 

She  was  now  told  that  she  was  to  be  tried  for  being  a 
witch.  She  was  taken  time  after  time  before  the  bishop  with 
his  court  of  priests.  Time  after  time  she  was  asked  question 
after  question  about  her  voices.  The  bishop  tried  to  make 
her  say  that  they  were  from  the  devil  and  not  from  God,  but 
Joan  felt  that  this  was  not  true.  She  was  kept  in  prison,  and 
grew  very  ill  as  the  trial  went  on,  but  she  always  answered 
sensibly  and  wisely,  and  though  the  cunning  bishop  tried 
often  to  catch  her  in  some  mean  way,  she  never  once  made 
any  slip,  always  answering  simply  and  to  the  point.  Some- 
times indeed  her  answers  were  so  witty  that  they  made  the 
bishop  seem  very  foolish. 

At  last,  when  she  was  very  ill,  Joan  signed  a  paper  agree- 
ing that  her  voices  were  not  from  God,  but  afterwards  she  was 
sorry,  and  held  to  her  word  again.  Then  she  was  condemned 
to  die,  and  was  burnt  as  a  witch  in  the  market-place  of 
Rouen.  As  she  stood  tied  to  the  stake  she  said  once  more, 
'  Yes,  my  voices  were  from  God,'  and  then,  as  the  flames  rose 
up  around  her,  she  bent  her  head,  saying  '  Jesus,'  and  died. 

An  English  soldier  standing  near  was  heard  to  say,  '  We 


THE  END  OF  THE  MIDDLE  AGES  289 

are  lost,  for  we  have  burned  a  saint.'  The  French  people 
long  after  said  that  a  white  dove  rose  out  of  the  ashes 
of  the  fire  in  which  Joan  of  Arc  was  burned,  and  that  it 
was  the  dove,  peace,  which  she  had  brought  to  France. 

For  though  Joan  died  in  this  terrible  way  her  work  went 
on.  The  French  soldiers  could  never  forget  her,  and  the 
English,  too,  were  always  haunted  by  her  memory.  It  was 
not  long  before  the  English  were  driven  right  out  of  France, 
and  only  the  town  of  Calais  remained  to  them  of  all  they  had 
won  and  lost  in  the  Hundred  Years'  War. 

Joan  of  Arc  is  now  looked  upon  by  the  French,  and  other 
people  too,  as  one  of  the  greatest  women  who  have  ever  lived. 
The  Church  has  called  her  a  saint,  and  in  the  market-place  of 
Rouen,  where  she  was  burned,  may  be  seen  now  the  statue  of 
the  girl  of  seventeen  who  gave  her  life  to  save  France. 

In  England,  even  before  the  French  War  was  over,  things 
were  very  miserable.  Henry  vi.  grew  up  to  be  a  very  weak 
man.  It  seemed  as  though  he  had  almost  inherited  the 
madness  of  his  grandfather,  Charles  vi.  of  France.  Henry 
was  very  religious  and  fond  of  learning,  but  he  had  no  idea  of 
how  to  govern  the  country.  One  of  the  great  dukes,  Richard, 
Duke  of  York,  made  up  his  mind  to  get  the  crown  for  him- 
self. He  fought  against  the  king  and  shut  him  up  in  prison, 
and  at  last  Henry  said  that  Richard  should  rule  England  for 
him  while  he  lived  and  be  king  when  he  died. 

Margaret  of  Anjou,  the  king's  wife,  would  not  hear  of  this. 
She  meant  her  son,  the  young  Prince  Edward,  to  be  king  after 
his  father  as  was  right.  For  years  all  the  great  nobles  in 
England  fought,  some  on  the  one  side  and  some  on  the  other. 
The  wars  were  called  the  Wars  of  the  Roses,  because  the 
Yorkists  wore  white  roses  and  King  Henry's  side  red.  King 
Henry  died  miserably  early  in  the  struggle,  and  the  poor  little 
Prince  Edward,  whom  Margaret  had  tried  so  hard  to  protect, 
was  killed  on  a  battlefield.  Richard,  Duke  of  York,  was 
killed  too,  but  his  son  Edward  became  king  as  Edward  iv. 

Nearly  all  the  nobles  of  England  had  been  killed  in  the 


290  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

Wars  of  the  Roses,  and  King  Edward  iv.  was  able  to  rule 
England  more  strongly  that  any  king  during  the  fifteenth 
century.  Parliament,  which  still  met,  had  grown  very  weak 
now  that  there  were  so  few  nobles  to  lead  it.  From  the  time 
that  Edward  iv.  became  king,  the  kings  of  England  were 
almost  despots  for  some  hundreds  of  years.  Parliament  met, 
but  only  to  do  what  the  king  told  it.  Edward  hardly  ever 
called  parliament  together  at  all.  But  at  the  time  this  was 
quite  a  good  thing  for  England.  The  people  wanted  peace 
after  so  many  years  of  war  abroad  and  at  home.  Even  during 
the  Wars  of  the  Roses  the  middle  classes  in  England  had 
gone  peacefully  on  with  their  business  and  trade.  Towns 
were  getting  larger,  and  new  ones  were  growing  up.  Things 
were  growing  more  orderly  than  they  had  been  in  the  Middle 
Ages. 

When  Edward  iv.  died  there  was  a  short  time  of  trouble. 
His  two  little  sons,  the  elder  of  whom  should  have  been  king, 
were  shut  up  in  the  Tower  of  London,  and  probably  killed 
there  by  their  uncle,  who  had  himself  made  king  and  was 
called  Richard  iii.  But  he  did  not  reign  long.  The  crown 
was  taken  from  him  by  Henry,  Earl  of  Richmond,  who 
belonged  to  the  family  of  Henry  vi.  He  fought  with  Richard, 
who  was  killed  in  the  battle  of  Bosworth  Field,  and  was 
crowned  on  the  field  with  the  crown  which  rolled  from  the 
dead  king's  head. 

The  new  king  was  called  Henry  vii.  He  was  the  first 
king  of  the  great  House  of  Tudor.  He  ruled  England  very 
much  as  Edward  iv.  had  done,  and  in  his  time  the  Middle 
Ages  seem  to  come  to  an  end  in  England.  Great  new 
changes  were  coming  near,  which  seem  to  bring  the  beginnings 
of  modern  times. 

In  France,  after  the  English  had  been  driven  out,  the 
kings  grew  more  powerful  too.  Charles  vii.,  the  dauphin 
whom  Joan  of  Arc  took  to  Rheims  to  be  crowned,  got  an 
army  together  of  the  middle  classes  of  Frenchmen,  like  the 
English  armies,  and  no  longer  depended  so  much  on  the  great 


THE  END  OF  THE  MIDDLE  AGES 


291 


lords.  Charles  vii.  became  almost  mad  like  his  father  before 
he  died,  but  his  son,  Louis  xi.,  went  on  with  the  struggle 
against  the  nobles. 

He  was  a  clever  and  cunning  king,  but  not  a  good  man. 
He  tried  hard  to  get  the  lands  of  some  of  the  greatest  French 
nobles  for  the  crown,  and  even  sometimes  murdered  people 
who  stood  in  his  way.  He  was  naturally  cruel,  and  it  was 
said  that  he  even  shut  up  some  of  his  enemies  in  iron  cages, 
and  kept  them  there  for  years.  Louis  had  a  long  struggle, 
especially  with  Charles  the  Bold  of  Burgundy.  In  the  end 
he  won  Burgundy  for  the  French  crown,  but  Flanders  and 
the  Low  Countries,  the  lands  to  the  North  of  France  which 
are  now  called  Holland  and  Belgium,  and  which  also  belonged 
to  Charles  the  Bold,  went  to  the  Emperor  Maximilian,  who 
married  Charles's  daughter  Mary.  Louis  xi.  left  the  French 
crown  very  strong  and  powerful  for  the  kings  who  came  after 
him,  and  in  the  next  century  the  kings  of  France  were  despots 
like  the  Tudor  kings  of  England.  In  France,  too,  this  change 
seems  to  be  the  beginning  of  modern  times. 


THE    END    OF    THE    MIDDLE    AGES  :    TWO    KNIGHTS    ABOUT    TO    BEGIN    A    JOUST 
(From  a  fourteenth-century  manuscript). 


CHAPTER   XXVIII 

THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  MODERN  TIMES 

Towards  the  end  of  the  fifteenth  century  many  changes 
took  place  which  made  immense  differences  in  all  the 
countries  of  Europe.  It  is  often  said  that  this  time  was 
really  the  end  of  the  Middle  Ages  and  the  beginning  of 
modern  times,  and  in  many  ways  this  is  true.  Yet  we  must 
remember  that  the  people  of  the  sixteenth  century  were  very 
different  in  many  ways  from  the  people  we  know  to-day. 
All  changes  in  history  have  taken  place  slowly. 

Still  the  people  of  the  sixteenth  century  were  more  like 
ourselves  in  their  ways  and  thoughts  than  like  the  people 
of  the  Middle  Ages. 

In  the  later  fifteenth  century  many  things  were  happening 
to  bring  about  this  change.  People  were  beginning  to  ask 
questions  about  all  sorts  of  things  which  they  had  never 
thought  of  in  the  Middle  Ages. 

In  Italy  especially  men  were  beginning  to  take  a  new 
interest  in  learning.  Instead  of  studying  chiefly  theology 
and  the  writings  of  the  philosophers  of  the  Middle  Ages, 
they  began  to  take  a  new  interest  in  the  old  Greek  and  Roman 
philosophers  and  poets. 

In  nearly  all  the  city-states  of  Northern  Italy  some  great 
family  had  seized  power.  In  Florence,  a  great  family  of 
bankers  called  the  Medici  really  ruled  the  city  and  the 
country  round,  which  Florence  had  conquered. 

All  these  great  families,  and  the  princes  at  their  head, 
tried  to  make  their  courts  famous  for  learning  and  poetry 

292 


THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  MODERN  TIMES     293 

and  art.  The  greater  number  of  scholars  and  artists  they 
could  gather  round  them,  the  better  pleased  they  were. 

Ever  since  the  time  of  Giotto,  in  the  fourteenth  century, 
there  had  been  great  painters  in  Italy,  but  it  was  at  the  end 
of  the  fifteenth  century  and  the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth 
that  the  greatest  Italian  painters  did  their  work. 

All  these  new  interests,  which  began  in  Italy  and  soon 
spread  to  the  other  countries  of  Europe,  are  described  by 
one  word,  the  '  Renaissance,'  which  means  the  '  new  birth.' 
It  seemed  as  though  the  minds  of  men,  after  a  long  time  in 
which  they  obeyed  and  kept  to  certain  ways  of  thinking, 
were  now  set  free  to  think  as  they  pleased. 

The  result  of  the  Renaissance  or  the  Revival  of  Learning, 
as  it  was  sometimes  called,  was  that  the  scholars  and  artists 
of  the  time  began  to  despise  the  Middle  Ages  as  savage  and 
barbarous  and  to  look  back  to  the  great  days  of  Greece  and 
Rome  as  times  of  the  highest  civilization.  Sometimes  these 
men  forgot  the  terrible  cruelties  of  the  Greeks  and  Romans, 
and  forgot  too  how  much  better  the  world  had  become  in 
many  ways  during  the  Middle  Ages. 

The  scholars  of  the  Renaissance  in  Italy  did  not  write  very 
interesting  things,  because  they  were  always  trying  to  imitate 
the  writings  of  the  Greeks  and  Romans,  so  that  in  this  time, 
although  men  were  much  more  learned  than  in  the  Middle 
Ages,  there  were  no  great  poets  like  Dante  and  Petrarch, 
the  poets  of  the  Middle  Ages. 

The  Italian  scholars  were  always  pleased  to  find  a  Greek 
and  learn  his  language  from  him,  for  though  Latin  was,  of 
course,  spoken  by  all  scholars  in  the  Middle  Ages,  very  few 
knew  Greek,  and  these  Italians  of  the  Renaissance  were 
eager  to  read  the  writings  of  the  great  Greeks  in  their  own 
language.  Then  something  happened  which  brought  great 
crowds  of  Greeks  into  Italy,  ready  to  teach  the  Italians  all 
they  knew.  This  was  the  capture  of  Constantinople  by  the 
Turks  in  the  year  1453,  which  is  often  said  to  have  been  the 
beginning  of  the  Renaissance. 


294  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

The  Fall  of  Constantinople 

For  many  years  before  this  the  Mohammedan  lands  of 
Western  Asia  had  been  conquered  and  overrun  by  a  new 
branch  of  the  Turks,  called  the  Ottoman  Turks.  They  then 
crossed  into  the  East  of  Europe,  and  conquered  land  to  the 
north  of  the  Balkan  Peninsula.  Hungary  and  Poland  were 
only  saved  by  the  desperate  bravery  of  the  Hungarian  hero, 
John  Hunyadi,  whose  son,  Matthias  Corvinus,  became  king 
of  Hungary  later.  Since  the  days  when  the  Venetians  and 
other  crusaders  had  taken  Constantinople  from  the  Greek 
Emperor,  the  Eastern  Empire  had  been  very  miserable  and 
weak.  The  Greeks  had  won  back  Constantinople,  but  never 
got  back  their  former  possessions.  New  kingdoms  like 
Bulgaria  now  grew  up  out  of  land  which  had  once  belonged 
to  the  Empire. 

In  the  Balkan  Peninsula  the  Ottoman  Turks  had  already 
won  much  land  when  they  turned  against  Constantinople. 
The  last  emperor  was  named  like  the  first,  who  had  taken 
Byzantium  for  his  capital,  Constantine.  He  was  a  weak 
man,  and  his  nobles  had  no  idea  of  fighting.  Yet  they  did 
their  best  to  defend  their  city.  Constantine  begged  for  help 
from  the  Pope.  There  had  been  attempts  during  the  century 
to  join  the  Eastern  and  VYestern  Churches  again,  but  they 
had  not  been  successful. 

Now  no  one  went  to  the  help  of  the  Greeks.  A  Christian 
had  invented  for  the  fierce  Turkish  sultan,  who  was  called 
Mohammed  ii.,  a  gun  which  could  throw  a  cannon  ball, 
weighing  three  hundred  pounds,  the  length  of  a  mile.  The 
Greeks  had  nothing  but  the  most  old-fashioned  weapons,  and 
the  nobles,  who  had  spent  their  lives  in  luxury,  were  not 
strong  enough  even  to  wear  the  heavy  armour  which  it  was 
still  the  fashion  to  use.  Mohammed,  who  was  a  terribly 
cruel  man  and  lived  a  very  wicked  life,  easily  took  the 
city. 

Constantine,  weak  though  he  was,  was  too  proud  to  be 


THE    CAPTURE    OF    CONSTANTINOPLE    IN    I453    BY    THE    TURKS    WHEN    THE    LAST 
EMPEROR    OF    BYZANTIUM    MET    HIS    HEROIC    DEATH. 
(From  the  painting  by  Tintoretto  in  the  Ducal  Palace  at  Venice.) 


THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  MODERN  TIMES     295 

taken  prisoner  by  his  conqueror,  and  mixed  with  his  soldiers 
so  that  no  one  might  know  that  he  was  the  Emperor,  and 
so  he  died  with  the  rest.  Mohammed  turned  his  soldiers 
loose  for  three  days  to  rob  and  kill.  Thousands  of  people 
were  killed  in  the  streets  and  churches.  Many  had  taken 
shelter  in  the  great  church  of  Saint  Sofia,  but  they,  too,  were 
killed.  The  church  itself  was  afterwards  changed  into  a 
mosque  for  the  Mohammedans,  though  the  other  churches 
were  left  to  the  Christians.  Many  thousands  of  people  were 
sold  into  slavery. 

Constantinople  has  belonged  to  the  Turks  from  that  day 
to  this.  It  was  not  long  before  they  conquered  the  whole 
of  the  Balkan  Peninsula,  and  not  till  more  than  three 
hundred  years  later  did  Greece  win  back  her  freedom.  Other 
nations,  like  Bulgaria  and  Servia,  are  still  fighting  for  theirs. 

No  sooner  was  Constantinople  taken  than  scholars  in 
hundreds,  collecting  the  precious  manuscripts  which  held 
the  writings  of  the  great  Greeks,  fled  West,  chiefly  to  Italy, 
where  the  princes  and  scholars  of  the  Renaissance  welcomed 
them.  Above  all  were  they  welcomed  in  Florence,  which 
was  always  the  chief  city  of  the  Italian  Renaissance. 

It  had  great  memories  to  look  back  to.  Dante  and 
Petrarch  were  both  Florentines.  The  first  Medici  ruler  of 
Florence,  Cosmo  de  Medici,  who  was  still  ruling  Florence 
when  Constantinople  was  taken  by  the  Greeks,  was  a  great 
builder.  He  had  for  his  architects  Michelozzo  and  Brunellesco, 
two  of  the  greatest  artists  of  the  time.  It  was  Brunellesco 
who  built  the  beautiful  white  marble  cathedral  of  Our  Lady 
of  the  Flowers  at  Florence. 

The  architects,  like  the  scholars  of  the  time,  despised 
everything  belonging  to  the  Middle  Ages,  so  Brunellesco 
did  not  build  a  Gothic  cathedral.  He  studied  the  old 
Roman  buildings  and  built  in  the  same  way  as  the  old 
Roman  architects,  and  his  cupola  or  dome  at  Florence  is 
one  of  the  wonders  of  the  world.  The  Italian  cathedrals 
generally   have   a   baptistery   and   a   bell  tower   built  quite 


296 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


separately  from  the  cathedral.  The  baptistery  at  Florence 
has  bronze  doors  covered  with  the  most  wonderful  sculpture 
done  by  an  artist  called  Ghiberti. 

For  the  new  sculpture  of  the  Renaissance  was  quite 
different  from  that  of  the  Middle  Ages.  The  porches  of 
the  Gothic   cathedrals  were  often   covered  with   statues  of 

the  saints,  but  they  were 


often  stiiF  and  lifeless, 
though  very  charming  in 
their  way.  But  the  men 
of  the  Renaissance  carved 
beautiful  statues  often 
nearly  as  beautiful  as 
those  of  the  great  Greek 
sculptors.  Especially  in 
Florence  were  great  sculp- 
tors to  be  found.  Perhaps 
the  best  of  all  the  early 
sculptors  was  Donatello, 
whose  work  may  still  be 
seen  in  some  of  the  most 
beautiful  marble  tombs 
in  the  fine  churches  of 
Florence. 

Later  the  sculpture 
of  the  great  Florentine, 
Michael  Angelo,  v  as  per- 
haps even  more  wonder- 
ful than  that  of  the  Greeks,  just  as  beautiful  in  form  and  with 
more  expression.  Cosmo  de  Medici  got  Brunellesco  to  build 
other  places  for  him  besides  the  cathedral.  He  built  the 
Dominican  convent  of  San  Marco,  on  the  walls  of  which  may 
still  be  seen  the  wonderful  pictures  by  one  of  the  friars,  Fra 
Angelico.  Although  Fra  Angelico  was  a  painter  of  the  early 
Renaissance,  he  was  quite  different  from  the  other  painters  of 
the  time,  and  even  from  Giotto,  who  was  so  much  earlier.    The 


COSMO    DE    MEDICI    AS    ONE    OF    THE 
WISE    MEN 

(From  the  painting  of  the  Adoration  of  the  "Wise 

Men,  by  Sandro  Botticelli,  who  included  a  portrait 

of  his  patron). 


THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  MODERN  TIMES     297 

other  painters  tried  to  paint  much  more  naturally  than  Fra 
Angelico.  They  painted  religious  subjects,  too,  but  they 
made  the  figures  like  the  people  they  saw  around  them. 
One  of  the  painters  whom  Cosmo  de  Medici  helped  was 
Sandro  Botticelli,  and  in  his  picture  of  the  Adoration  of  the 
Magi,  one  of  the  wise  men  was  a  portrait  of  Cosmo  himself. 

But  Fra  Angelico  had  a  gift  of  producing  beautiful 
colour,  and  his  saints  had  faces  of  the  most  wonderful  ex- 
pression, although  they  were  stiff  and  not  well  drawn.  It 
is  said  that  he  would  cry  all  the  time  he  was  painting  a 
Crucifixion,  which  was  one  of  his  favourite  subjects.  His 
real  name  was  John,  but  he  was  called  '  Angelico '  because 
of  his  goodness  and  sweetness  of  temper. 

Cosmo  de  Medici  was  a  good  Christian,  but  many  of  the 
great  men  of  the  Renaissance  turned  against  their  religion 
and  became,  or  pretended  to  become,  pagans  like  the  old 
Greeks  and  Romans,  whom  they  admired  so  much. 

Cosmo's  grandson,  Lorenzo  the  Magnificent,  was  one  of 
these.  He  was  the  greatest  of  all  the  Italian  princes  who 
took  part  in  the  Renaissance.  He  himself  wrote  poetry, 
and  was  full  of  all  the  learning  of  the  time.  He  had  at  his 
court  the  greatest  scholars,  painters,  and  sculptors.  He 
collected  all  the  beautiful  old  statues  that  he  could  find  from 
different  parts  of  Italy  and  placed  them  in  the  beautiful 
gardens  round  his  palace.  It  was  in  these  gardens  and 
studying  this  sculpture  that  Michael  Angelo  took  his  first 
lessons. 

When  Lorenzo  de  Medici  heard  one  morning  a  friend 
saying  that  he  had  been  to  church  and  heard  Mass,  he  said : 
*  I  have  been  better  employed ;  I  have  been  asleep  and 
dreaming.' 

But  the  popes  of  this  time  were  as  anxious  as  the  other 
princes  of  Italy  to  help  the  men  of  the  Renaissance.  Pope 
Nicholas  v.,  who  was  a  scholar  himself,  had  many  of  the 
Roman  churches  rebuilt,  and  sent  for  painters  to  come  and 
paint  their  pictures  on  the  walls.     For  in  those  days  frescoes, 


298  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

or  paintings  of  pictures  on  walls,  were  the  chief  way  of 
decorating  churches. 

Fra  Angelico  died  in  Rome  after  doing  some  painting 
there.  Pope  Nicholas  v.  collected  five  thousand  manuscripts 
for  the  library  of  the  Vatican,  the  palace  of  the  popes  at 
Rome. 

The  only  way  the  Greeks  and  Romans  had  of  making 
'  books  '  was  writing  with  a  pointed  instrument  on  long  rolls 
of  parchment.  A  long  book  would  fill  many  yards  of  parch- 
ment. These  were  rolled  up  and  kept  in  jars  or  wooden 
boxes.  In  the  days  of  the  early  Renaissance,  the  only  way 
of  spreading  the  writings  of  the  Greeks  was  to  copy  the 
valuable  manuscripts  brought  by  the  Greeks  who  had  fled 
from  Constantinople.  But  in  the  middle  of  the  fifteenth 
century  suddenly  '  printing  '  was  invented. 

The  Beginning  of  Printing 

In  the  fourteenth  century  people  had  begun  '  block ' 
printing.  A  drawing  would  be  made  on  a  block  of  wood, 
and  then  all  the  wood  which  was  not  drawn  on  would  be  cut 
away.  The  letters  or  drawing  was  then  smeared  with  oily 
ink,  and  pressed  on  to  paper.  In  this  way  pictures  and  even 
books  had  been  made,  but  it  was  in  the  fifteenth  century  that 
real  printing  was  invented.  Then  some  one  in  Germany  or 
in  Holland  arranged  letters  cut  out  of  metal  whici  could  be 
put  together  to  form  words,  and  then,  when  they  were 
smeared  with  ink  and  many  copies  printed  off,  the  letters 
could  be  put  together  again  to  form  other  words,  and  so  on. 

Most  people  think  that  it  was  a  German  called  John 
Gutenberg,  who  lived  at  the  town  of  Mainz,  on  the  river 
Rhine,  who  invented  this  way  of  printing.  One  of  the  first 
books  printed  by  Gutenberg  was  the  Bible.  It  was  a  very 
beautiful  book,  for  the  early  printing  was  beautifully  clear. 
Soon  Gutenberg's  invention  spread,  and  every  big  town,  and 
even  the   larger   monasteries   in  the   countries  of  Western 


THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  MODERN  TIMES     299 


Europe,  soon  had  their  printing  press.  Before  the  end  of  the 
century  there  were  over  a  thousand  in  Germany.  German 
printers  travelled  into  France,  and  Spain,  and  Italy,  but  soon 
these  countries  had  their  own  printers  too.  Sometimes  the 
trade  would  be  passed  on  from  father  to  son  in  one  family. 
The  family  of  the  Aldi  at  Venice  became  very  famous  for 
their  beautiful  printing,  and  collectors  of  beautiful  books  now 
are  very  glad  when  they 
get  an  '  Aldine '  edition. 

The  first  printing  press 
in  England  was  set  up  in 
the  sanctuary  of  West- 
minster Abbey  some  time 
about  the  year  1475,  by 
a  man  called  William 
Caxton.  He  had  been  a 
merchant,  and  lived  for  a 
long  time  at  Bruges,  and 
had  gone  to  Cologne  to 
learn  the  '  new  art '  from 
a  printer  there.  The  first 
book  he  printed  was  called 
the  Game  and  Play  of  the 
Chess,  but  this  was  before 
he  came  back  to  England. 
In  England  he  printed 
many  books,  and  among 
others  were  Chaucer  s  JVo?^ks. 

The  invention  of  printing  was  a  very  wonderful  thing,  and 
had  very  important  results.  Instead  of  one  book  being  copied 
out  with  much  labour  by  one  man,  many  copies  could  be 
printed  in  less  time  by  the  press,  though,  of  course,  even  the 
printing  presses  at  first  could  not  print  books  as  quickly  as 
we  can  have  them  done  now. 

At  first  people  called  printing  the  '  Holy  Art,'  or  some- 
times the  'Divine  Art,'  and  in  England  no  book  could  be 


AN    EARLY    PRINTER  S    OFFICE 
(From  a  sixteenth -century  engraving). 


/ 


300  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

printed  without  permission  of  the  Church  and  the  king's 
council.  Of  course  it  was  still  only  the  richer  people  or  those 
who  were  going  to  be  priests  who  could  read,  but  later  educa- 
tion spread,  and  the  printing  of  books  helped  this.  When 
people  had  books  to  read  for  themselves,  they  did  not  feel  so 
dependent  on  the  preachers  of  the  Church  as  they  had  done 
in  the  Middle  Ages,  and  this  again  encouraged  the  new  free 
and  independent  feeling  which  so  many  men  of  the  Renais- 
sance had. 

Another  great  discovery  which  gave  people  new  thoughts 
and  ideas  about  the  world  was  that  the  earth  was  not 
standing  still,  as  people  in  olden  days  and  in  the  Middle  Ages 
had  believed.  It  had  always  been  thought  that  the  earth  was 
the  centre  of  the  universe,  and  that  the  sun,  moon  and  stars 
whirled  round  her  once  in  every  twenty-four  hours,  and  that 
this  was  what  caused  day  and  night.  When  the  sun  came 
round  and  shone  opposite  any  particular  place,  that  place  had 
day,  and  when  the  sun  had  passed  over,  then  it  had  night. 
But  at  the  end  of  the  fifteenth  century  there  appeared  a 
scholar  who  told  people  that  this  was  not  true,  that  it  was 
the  earth  which  was  moving  and  not  the  sun. 

This  scholar  was  named  Copernicus,  and  he  was  born  in 
Poland.  When  he  was  a  boy  he  loved  mathematics  and 
astronomy,  the  study  of  the  stars,  and  when  he  was  a  young 
man  he  went  to  Rome  to  lecture  there.  But  soon  he  went 
back  to  Poland,  and  spent  years  and  years  making  instru- 
ments, and  searching  the  sky  night  after  night,  hoping  to 
find  out  the  truth. 

When  he  at  last  told  people  that  the  earth  was  moving 
faster  than  anything  we  know  can  ever  move,  and  that  it 
turns  right  round  on  its  axis  once  in  every  twenty-four 
hours,  and  that  this  was  what  caused  day  and  night,  people 
laughed  at  him.  Some  people  even  thought  it  was  wicked 
for  Copernicus  to  say  these  things,  and  when  his  friends  asked 
him  to  explain  all  these  things  in  a  book,  these  other  people 
were  very  angry.     But  Copernicus  wrote  his  book,  and  it  was 


THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  MODERN  TIMES     301 

taken  to  be  printed  at  Nuremberg,  one  of  the  chief  places  for 
printing  in  Germany. 

People  had  become  so  excited  and  angry  about  the  new 
teaching  of  Copernicus,  that  the  printers  had  to  work  with  a 
loaded  gun  beside  them  to  protect  themselves.  Two  of  the 
scholar's  friends  stayed  by  day  and  night  to  protect  the  book. 
At  last  it  was  finished.  But  Copernicus  lay  dying.  He  was 
worn  out  with  work  and  anxiety,  but  as  he  lay  on  his  death- 
bed horsemen  galloped  up  with  copies  of  his  book,  and  so  he 
had  the  happiness  of  knowing  before  he  died  that  nothing 
could  now  prevent  the  truth  which  he  had  found  out  being 
known  to  all  the  world.     And  so  he  died  happy. 

Since  the  time  of  Copernicus  many  new  and  wonderful 
discoveries  have  been  made  about  the  sun  and  the  stars,  but 
his  was  the  greatest  discovery  of  all. 

While  Copernicus  had  been,  as  it  were,  showing  people  a 
new  heaven,  great  and  wonderful  discoveries  had  been  made 
also  about  the  earth  itself,  and  great  and  brave  men  were 
able  to  show  a  new  earth  too. 


CHAPTER   XXIX 

A  NEW  WORLD 

At  the  end  of  the  fifteenth  century  there  appeared  a  man 
who  startled  people  as  much  as  Copernicus  with  his  new 
ideas  about  the  stars.  The  thing  which  this  man,  the  great 
Christopher  Columbus,  said  was  that  the  earth  was  round. 
People  thought  this  very  ridiculous,  for  could  not  any  one 
see  that  the  earth  was  flat,  but  Columbus  only  repeated : 
'  Sail  to  the  West  and  you  will  find  the  East.' 

This  sounded  like  the  words  of  a  madman,  but  what 
Columbus  meant  was  that  if  men  could  sail  across  the 
Atlantic  they  would  come  round  to  the  other  side  of  the 
continent  of  India.  Of  course  every  one  knows  now  that 
Columbus  was  right  when  he  said  the  world  was  round,  but 
to  the  people  of  that  time  it  sounded  foolish.  Columbus 
himself  was  soon  to  sail  across  the  Atlant'c,  the  '  Sea  of 
Darkness '  as  it  was  then  called,  and  find  land  across  it.  He 
thought  that  it  was  India,  and  never  knew  before  he  died  that 
it  was  really  the  great  continent  of  America,  which  people  up 
to  that  time  had  known  nothing  about.  It  was  true  that  if 
Columbus  had  sailed  round  the  coast  of  America  and  on  he 
would  have  reached  the  coast  of  India. 

Columbus  was  born  in  Genoa,  one  of  the  great  seafaring 
towns  of  North  Italy,  but  it  was  to  the  court  of  the  king  of 
Portugal  that  he  went  to  tell  his  tale,  and  to  ask  for  money 
and  ships  to  help  him  to  sail  across  the  Atlantic  to  reach  the 
East  by  going  West. 

The  reason  for  this  was  that  the  sailors  of  Portugal  had 

302 


A  NEW  WORLD  303 

been  making  voyages  of  discovery  all  through  the  century, 
though  none  had  ever  ventured  across  the  Atlantic. 

Portugal  v^as  one  of  the  Christian  kingdoms  which  had 
been  formed  in  the  Spanish  Peninsula  during  the  long 
struggle  between  the  Christians  and  the  Saracens,  which  went 
on  all  through  the  Middle  Ages.  The  little  kingdom  ran 
along  the  Western  coast  of  the  Peninsula,  and  its  people 
naturally  were  very  much  interested  in  the  sea. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  fifteenth  century,  one  of  the  sons 
of  King  John  of  Portugal,  called  Prince  Henry,  had  made  up 
his  mind  to  give  his  life  to  helping  to  find  out  something 
about  the  new  lands  which  lay  beyond  those  which  the  men 
of  the  Middle  Ages  had  known.  In  the  Middle  Ages  the 
Mediterranean  Sea  had  been,  as  it  were,  the  centre  of  the 
world.  The  lands  which  had  been  won  by  the  Roman 
Empire  were  thought  to  be  the  most  Westerly  part  of  the 
earth.  Beyond  them  men  thought  that  the  Atlantic  Ocean 
stretched  across  to  the  ends  of  the  earth.  To  the  East  were 
the  great  stretches  of  Asia,  and  China  had  been  reached  by 
Franciscans  who  went  to  try  to  convert  the  Great  Khan,  the 
great  ruler  of  the  Mongol  race,  which  had  conquered  so  much 
of  Asia  in  the  thirteenth  century. 

The  only  men  in  the  Middle  Ages  whom  we  know 
travelled  for  the  love  of  discovery  were  three  Venetians, 
Marco  Polo  and  his  father  and  uncle,  who  also  travelled  to 
the  court  of  the  Great  Khan  and  lived  there  many  years. 
Marco  Polo  wrote  an  account  of  all  he  had  seen,  but  very 
few  people  took  any  notice  of  it,  although  they  were  ready  to 
believe  the  wildest  and  most  impossible  tales  about  the  East. 
Marco  Polo's  father  and  uncle  had  started  off  from  Venice  to 
trade  at  Constantinople  the  year  that  Marco  was  born.  He 
was  fifteen  years  old  when  they  came  back  and  told  how  they 
had  crossed  Asia,  reached  China  and  seen  the  court  of  the 
Great  Khan.  They  were  going  back  again,  and  the  boy 
begged  to  go  with  them.  He  went,  and  the  Great  Khan 
was   pleased   to   have  him   at   his   court.     He   learned    the 


304 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


Chinese  language  and   travelled  into  Persia,  but  always  he 
went  back  to  the  court  of  the  Great  Khan. 

After  some  years  Marco  and  his  father  and  uncle  were 
anxious  to  go  home  again,  but  the  Great  Khan  hated  to  let 
them  go.  But  at  last,  after  seventeen  years,  he  did.  When 
they  arrived  in  Venice,  dressed  in  strange  clothes  like  the 
people  of  Asia,  people  would  not  believe  them  when  they 
told  them  who  they  were.     But  Marco  prepared  a  great  feast 


:?^V^c_ 


MARCO    POLO    LANDS    AT    A    CITY    IN    PERSL\ 

(From  a  miniature  painting  in  a  French  Book  of  Marvels  of  the  fourteenth  century). 


to  which  they  asked  their  friends,  and  he  and  his  father  and 
uncle  appeared  dressed  in  beautiful  crimson  satin  robes. 

When  the  banquet  had  begun  they  removed  these  clothes 
and  put  on  others  just  as  beautiful,  while  the  first  ones  were 
cut  up  and  divided  among  the  servants.  Then  the  old  clothes 
in  which  they  had  come  back  from  Asia  were  brought  in 
and  the  seams  were  slit  up.  The  most  beautiful  jewels  fell 
out  of  them,  and  then  at  last  their  friends  believed  that  it 
was  really  the  Polos  come  back  with  great  treasures  from  the 
East. 


A  NEW  WORLD  305 

But  they  were  really  the  only  men  in  the  Middle  Ages 
who  seemed  to  have  been  anxious  to  visit  strange  lands.  In 
the  fifteenth  century  it  was  quite  different.  People  L'^came 
filled  with  a  wish  for  discovery  and  adventure.  It  was  part 
of  the  new  spirit  of  the  Renaissance.  And  this  was  how 
Prince  Henry  of  Portugal  gave  up  the  pleasant  life  at  his 
father's  court  and  went  to  live  on  a  lonely  spot  on  the 
Southern  coast  of  Portugal,  so  that  he  might  give  all  his  time 
to  the  study  of  seamanship. 

The  prince's  motto  was  *  Desire  to  do  well,'  and  he  seems 
to  have  felt  that  this  was  the  best  way  to  carry  it  out.  Up 
to  that  time  the  Northern  deserts  of  Africa  were  all  that  were 
known  of  that  continent,  but  Prince  Henry  sent  out  men 
and  ships  every  year,  and  they  sailed  farther  and  farther 
South  each  time. 

Before  this  people  had  believed  that  any  one  who  passed 
beyond  a  certain  point  on  the  coast  of  Africa  would  be 
changed  from  white  to  black.  It  had  been  thought,  too, 
that  that  part  of  the  world  would  be  too  hot  for  white  men 
to  live  in.  Some  people  said  that  there  were  great  monsters 
there,  and  the  sea  was  made  of  fire  or  at  least  of  boiling 
water.  But  now  it  was  seen  that  these  old  tales  were 
ridiculous,  and  Prince  Henry's  sailors  even  landed  on  the 
coast  of  what  is  now  called  Guinea,  and  brought  back  gold 
dust  which  they  found  there. 

They  also  brought  back  negroes  as  slaves  for  their  prince, 
who  was  kind  to  them  and  taught  them  to  be  Christians ;  but 
this  was  the  beginning  of  that  dreadful  slave  trade  in  which 
the  negroes  for  hundreds  of  years  were  carried  off  to  work  in 
far-off  countries  as  slaves  to  white  men. 

One  of  the  most  daring  sailors  who  sailed  along  the  coast 
of  Africa  in  Prince  Henry's  ships  was  a  Venetian  called 
Cadamosto,  and  he  has  written  an  account  of  his  adventures. 
He  tells  how  he  sailed  to  Madeira,  where  Portuguese  settlers 
were  already  living,  on  to  the  Canaries  and  then  on  to  Cape 
Blanco  or  the  White  Cape,  and  then  farther  South  still  to 

u 


306  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

the  mouth  of  the  river  Senegal,  where  the  negroes  thought 
at  first  that  the  ships  were  birds  and  then  that  they  must  be 
great  fishes.  They  thought,  too,  that  it  was  very  funny 
to  see  white  men,  and  they  tried  to  wash  the  white  off. 

Cadamosto  sailed  on  past  Cape  Verde,  which  was  the 
farthest  point  yet  reached  by  the  Portuguese.  He  could  not 
understand  why  the  Pole  Star  seemed  to  be  so  low  in  the  sky 
as  he  went  farther  South,  and  when  he  got  back  he  told  Prince 
Henry  about  it,  and  also  how  he  had  seen  a  new  and  brilliant 
group  of  stars  which  we  now  know  to  be  the  Southern  Cross. 
He  did  not  know  that  the  world  was  round,  and  that  these 
changes  in  the  position  of  the  stars  were  caused  by  his 
moving  over  the  curved  surface  of  the  earth. 

Prince  Henry  died  in  1460,  but  the  work  he  had  begun 
went  on.  In  a  few  years  the  Portuguese  had  crossed  the 
Equator  and  had  landed  near  the  mouth  of  the  river  Congo. 
The  black  king  of  Congo  received  them  with  great  honour. 
He  sat  without  any  clothes  at  all  on  a  throne  of  ivory.  He 
wore  copper  bracelets  on  his  arms  and  a  horse's  tail  hanging 
from  his  shoulder.  He  became  a  Christian,  and  sent  his 
children  to  Portugal  to  be  educated. 

At  last,  after  some  years,  a  brave  sailor  called  Bartholomew 
Diaz,  one  of  a  family  of  sailors  who  had  been  for  long  in 
Prince  Henry's  service,  sailed  right  round  the  South  of  Africa, 
passed  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope  and  into  Algoa  Bay.  Diaz 
would  have  liked  to  sail  much  farther,  but  his  men  were 
weary  and  impatient,  and  he  had  to  sail  for  Rome.  He  told 
the  king  of  Portugal  about  the  great  storm  they  had  had  to 
face  as  they  passed  the  Cape,  and  he  wanted  to  call  it  the 
Cape  of  Storms  ;  but  the  king  thought  that  the  Cape  of  Good 
Hope  would  be  a  much  better  name,  and  so  it  has  been  called 
to  this  day. 

The  king  of  Portugal  had  called  the  Cape  the  Cape  of 
Good  Hope  because  he  hoped  that  round  it  a  new  way 
would  be  found  to  India,  and  new  trade  with  that  land  would 
begin  between  West  and  East. 


A  NEW  WORLD  307 

Ten  years  after  he  sent  out  four  ships  under  one  of  his 
noblemen  called  Vasco  da  Gama  to  try  to  reach  India  in  this 
way.  The  ships  sailed  South,  and  were  nearly  wrecked  in 
trying  to  pass  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope.  The  sailors  wanted 
to  turn  back,  but  their  commander  was  very  stern  and  grave. 
They  were  going  on, -he  said,  whatever  happened,  and  so  they 
did.  They  sailed  joyfully  into  a  calm  sea  on  the  other  side 
of  the  Cape. 

But  another  storm  came,  and  again  the  men  wished 
to  turn  back,  but  their  leader  was  determined  to  push  on. 
He  worked  as  hard  as  any  of  his  men  in  managing  the 
ships  against  the  storm.  They  passed  the  island  of  Santa 
Cruz  near  Algoa  Bay,  and  saw  the  cross  which  Diaz  had 
set  up,  for  this  was  how  the  Portuguese  showed  that  they 
had  taken  possession  of  the  land  in  the  name  of  their 
king. 

At  last,  on  Christmas  Day,  they  sailed  into  the  mouth  of 
a  great  river  which  they  called  the  River  of  Mercy,  to  show 
their  gratitude  for  the  time  of  peace  and  rest  they  were  to 
enjoy  there.  But  this  name  has  not  remained  as  most  of  the 
beautiful  names  which  the  Portuguese,  and  after  them  the 
Spaniards,  gave  to  the  lands  they  discovered,  and  because 
they  found  it  on  the  birthday  or  natal  day  of  Our  Lord  they 
called  it  Natal.  It  is  now  called  the  Zambesi  River.  From 
here  they  sailed  up  the  East  coast,  and  a  friendly  king  gave 
them  a  pilot  to  lead  them  across  the  sea  to  India. 

It  was  twenty-three  days  before  they  reached  Calicut. 
Here  the  natives  received  them  gladly,  hoping  they  had 
brought  gold,  silver,  corals  and  scarlet  cloth,  for  which  they 
were  ready  to  give  them  cinnamon,  cloves,  ginger,  and  many 
spices  in  return.  These  natives  did  not  belong  to  the  Aryan 
race  like  the  people  of  Northern  India,  but  were  smaller  and 
darker,  and  rather  like  negroes.  The  Portuguese  had  not 
brought  so  much  as  the  king  of  Calicut  had  hoped,  but  they 
sailed  home  again  very  content  and  landed  in  Portugal  nearly 
three  years  after  the  time  they  had  sailed  away.     There  was 


308  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

great  rejoicing  in  Portugal  and  in  Europe,  except  indeed  in 
Venice. 

The  Venetians  were  sad,  for  it  was  they  who  up  to  now 
had  received  the  rich  silks  and  spices  of  India,  and  sold  them 
in  Europe.  Arabs  and  Moors  had  carried  these  things  to 
Ormuz,  a  town  on  the  Persian  Gulf;  caravans  had  carried 
them  across  Asia  Minor  to  the  Venetian  ships  on  the  coast, 
or  they  were  carried  in  ships  to  the  Isthmus  of  Suez,  and 
then  in  caravans  to  Cairo  and  in  ships  again  down  the  Nile  to 
Alexandria,  where  again  Venetian  ships  were  ready  to  receive 
them. 

But  now  the  way  by  sea  would  be  much  simpler,  and 
besides  the  Portuguese  took  care  to  prevent  things  going  in 
the  old  way,  and  so  Venice  was  ruined.  The  days  of  her 
greatness  were  over.  She  has  remained  ever  since  beautiful 
but  sad.  Strangers  crowd  to  see  her  beautiful  churches  and 
palaces,  both  Gothic  and  Renaissance,  and  her  wonderful 
pictures,  for  Venice  was  only  second  to  Florence  in  the  part 
she  took  in  the  Renaissance.  But  she  could  never  again  be 
the  proud  and  busy  city  she  had  been  in  the  days  when  she 
was  queen  of  trade  between  East  and  West. 

When  another  expedition  arrived  in  Calicut  the  king 
killed  many  of  the  men,  and  when  the  news  reached  Portugal, 
Vasco  da  Gama  set  out  once  more  to  take  vengeance  on  him. 
His  ships  sailed,  carrying  banners  and  crosses,  but  the  leader 
had  no  idea  of  Christian  forgiveness.  When  he  reached  India 
he  captured  eight  hundred  peaceful  merchants,  cut  off  their 
hands  and  ears  and  noses,  piled  them  up  in  a  ship  to  which 
he  set  fire  and  sent  it  drifting  to  the  shore.  This  was  to  be  a 
lesson  to  the  king  of  Calicut. 

Then  the  king  sent  ships  to  fight  the  Portuguese,  but  they 
were  clumsy  ships,  and  the  Portuguese  easily  fought  them  and 
killed  still  more  men.  Then  they  left  a  little  colony  of 
Portuguese  on  the  coast  near,  and  sailed  back  to  tell  their  king 
what  they  had  done.  Vasco  da  Gama  went  once  more  to 
India  some  years  later  and  died  there.     Another  Portuguese 


A  NEW  WORLD  309 

named  Albuquerque  set  up  a  colony  at  the  town  of  Goa  to  the 
North  of  Calicut,  and  it  became  the  great  trading  city  of  the 
Portuguese  in  India.  It  was  called  Golden  Goa  because  of  the 
great  riches  which  were  carried  from  it  in  ships  to  Portugal. 
No  one  but  the  Portuguese  were  allowed  to  trade  with  India. 
On  the  South  of  Africa,  Algoa  was  so  called  because 
ships  going  to  Goa  stopped  there,  and  on  their  way  back 
they  stopped  at  Delagoa,  which  means  '  From  Goa,'  and  so 
got  its  name.  The  story  of  how  the  Portuguese  sailed  round 
the  coast  of  Africa  and  across  to  India  is,  indeed,  very 
wonderful,  but  after  all  they  did  the  work  gradually.  One 
man  followed  where  another  led,  and  when  they  left  Africa 
to  sail  bravely  across  to  India  they  knew  that  land  was  there 
if  only  they  persevered  to  reach  it.  But  the  story  of  the  brave 
Columbus,  the  red-haired  sailor  with  the  blue  eyes,  who  stood 
gravely  before  the  king  of  Portugal  and  told  him  that  the 
world  was  round,  and  begged  for  money  and  ships  with  which 
to  sail  across  the  Atlantic  to  the  other  side  of  India,  is  more 
wonderful  and  romantic  still. 


CHAPTER  XXX 

CHRISTOPHER  COLUMBUS 

Christopher  Columbus  was  only  fourteen  years  old  when 
he  first  went  to  sea.  His  father  was  a  weaver  at  Genoa  and 
wanted  his  son  to  be  a  weaver  too,  but  Christopher  loved  the 
sea  passionately,  and  in  the  end  his  father  let  him  be  a  sailor 
instead.  Columbus  learned  all  he  could  about  the  sea  and 
ships,  and  he  came  to  this  conclusion,  which  seemed  so  strange 
to  the  people  of  his  time,  that  the  world  was  round. 

When  he  was  twenty-eight  years  old  he  went  to  Lisbon, 
the  capital  of  Portugal,  to  learn  what  he  could  there,  and  it 
was  six  years  after  this  that  he  went  to  the  court  to  get  help 
from  the  king  who  had  done  so  much  for  sailors  and  ships. 

The  king  listened  as  Columbus  gave  his  reasons  for 
believing  that  at  the  other  side  of  the  Atlantic  land  would 
be  found.  He  told  how  pieces  of  wood,  carved  in  strange 
ways,  had  been  carried  to  the  shores  of  Europe  by  the  west 
wind.  This,  he  said,  showed  that  in  land  to  the  west  of  the 
Atlantic  there  were  men  who  had  carved  this  wood.  He 
told  them,  too,  how  once  the  dead  bodies  of  two  men,  quite 
different  from  any  Europeans,  had  been  found,  and  how  on 
the  West  coast  of  Ireland  strange  plants  grew  up,  whose  seeds 
must  have  been  carried  by  the  wind  from  some  country  much 
warmer  than  Ireland. 

The  councillors  of  the  king  persuaded  him  not  to  trust 
Columbus,  and  got  him  to  send  off  some  ships  to  sail  some 
distance  west  on  the  Atlantic,  to  see  if  they  really  did  come 
to  any  signs  of  land.  The  ships  were  caught  in  a  storm  and 
soon  came  back,  but  when  Columbus  heard  of  this  he  felt 


THK    MAN    WHO    BEGAN    A    NEW    AGE    IN    THE    WORLD'S    HISTORY 
CHRISTOPHER    COLUMBUS,    DISCOVERER    OF    AMERICA. 
(From  the  best  portrait,  a  painting  at  Madrid. ) 


CHRISTOPHER  COLUMBUS  311 

that  he  had  been  insulted  and  would  have  nothing  more  to 
do  with  the  Portuguese.  Columbus  himself  was  always  very 
polite  to  other  people. 

He  now  went  to  the  king  and  queen  of  Spain,  the  famous 
Ferdinand  and  Isabella.  Ferdinand  had  been  king  of  Aragon 
and  Isabella  queen  of  Castile  when  they  married  each  other. 
Aragon  and  Castile  were  the  two  great  Christian  states 
formed  besides  Portugal  in  the  struggle  with  the  Moors. 
When  Ferdinand  and  Isabella  married,  their  two  kingdoms 
together  covered  nearly  the  whole  of  Spain. 

Both  Ferdinand  and  Isabella  were  people  of  strong 
character  and  clever.  They  made  up  their  minds  to  drive 
the  Saracen  rulers  right  out  of  Spain.  There  was  only  the 
little  kingdom  of  Granada  left  to  the  Moors,  and  against  this 
Ferdinand  fought.  He  led  his  armies  himself,  while  Isabella 
looked  after  the  government  of  his  country  and  her  own. 
Granada  was  taken,  and  the  Moorish  ruler  sadly  gave  up  his 
kingdom  and  went  to  Africa,  and  so  at  last  Spain,  after  a 
struggle  of  hundreds  of  years,  became  a  united  country  like 
France  or  England.  The  Moors  who  remained  in  Spain 
were  allowed  to  follow  their  own  religion,  but  two  centuries 
afterwards  they  were  driven  out  of  Spain  altogether. 

It  was  then  to  this  great  king  and  queen  that  Columbus 
went  to  tell  his  tale  when  he  was  insulted  by  the  Portuguese. 

But  the  king  and  queen  were  busy  in  these  years  fighting 
the  Moors,  and  it  was  not  until  the  year  1491  that  Columbus 
was  allowed  to  see  them  in  their  camp  near  Granada.  They 
also  thought  his  ideas  were  mad,  and  he  left  them  sadly.  But 
some  of  his  friends  persuaded  Queen  Isabella  to  help  him, 
and  when  she  began  to  understand  how  splendid  a  thing  this 
might  be,  she  declared  she  would  sell  all  her  jewels,  if  it  were 
necessary,  to  help  him. 

In  the  same  year  that  Granada  fell  Columbus  started  out 
in  a  Spanish  ship  on  his  strange  voyage.  He  had  received  the 
title  of  Admiral,  and  his  ship  was  called  the  Santa  Maria. 
Two  other  ships  went  too,  the  Nina  and  the  Pinta.     The 


312 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


sailors  were  very  frightened.  It  had  been  very  hard  to  get 
any  one  to  go.  Even  as  they  left  the  shore  many  of  them 
wept,  and  when  they  had  passed  the  Canary  Islands  and  were 
out  of  sight  of  land  altogether  they  even  spoke  to  each  other 
of  rebelhng.  Some  said  that  it  would  be  best  to  throw  the 
mad  admiral  into  the  sea  and  sail  back  to  Spain. 

Columbus  knew  all  this,  but  he  remained  quiet  and  brave, 

as    he    always   was.      He   had 
1^^=^^^^^^^^^^-^     learned  to  bear  disappointment 
^"    ^  "^       in  all  these  weary  years  while 

he  had  been  waiting  for  help 
in  his  great  plan.  He  spoke 
to  the  men  and  tried  to  make 
them  interested,  like  himself, 
in  the  voyage.  After  a  while 
even  the  sailors  began  to  see 
that  land  was 
which  belonged 
were  seen  and 
the  ship;  there  was  plenty  of 
floating  seaweed,  which  must 
have  come  from  some  shore ; 
and  best  proof  of  all,  there  was 
a  branch  of  a  tree  with  red 
berries  on  it. 

At  last  one  night  Columbus 
saw  a  light,  and  the  next  day 
they  landed  on  a  beautiful  island  covered  with  grass  and  with 
many  trees.  In  the  evening  before,  when  the  men  knew  that 
at  last  they  were  close  to  land,  the  sailors  of  the  Pinta  had 
struck  up  the  great  Latin  hymn  of  thanksgiving  called  the 
'  Te  Deum.' 

There  were  dark-skinned  natives  watching  Columbus  as 
he  planted  the  flag  of  Spain  on  the  shore,  set  up  a  large  cross 
and  took  possession  of  the  island  in  the  name  of  the  king  of 
Spain.     The  island  which  Columbus  had  discovered  was  one 


near.  Birds 
to  the  land 
heard    round 


COLUMBUS  S    SHIP 

(From  a  woodcut  of  1493,  supposed  to  have 

been  made  after  a  drawing  by  Columbus 

himself). 


CHRISTOPHER  COLUMBUS  313 

of  the  Bahama  Islands  in  the  West  Indies  off  the  coast  of 
America.  So  Columbus,  without  knowing  it,  had  discovered 
America,  that  great  new  continent  to  which  in  after  years 
so  many  thousands  of  people  from  Europe,  especially  from 
England,  were  to  swarm.  The  discovery  of  this  little  island 
by  Columbus  was  the  greatest  thing  that  has  happened  in 
modern  history. 

But  Columbus  himself  only  knew  that  he  had  come 
round  to  land  on  the  other  side  of  the  great  sea  which  people 
had  thought  reached  to  the  end  of  the  world. 

Columbus  sailed  to  one  island  after  another,  always  looking 
for  the  gold  and  spices  which  he  wanted  to  take  home  from 
India  to  the  king  and  queen.  The  Santa  Maria  struck  on  a 
rock  off  the  Island  of  Hayti,  and  was  wrecked.  Columbus 
and  his  sailors  went  on  board  the  Nina.  It  was  not  big 
enough  to  hold  them  all,  and  so  a  little  colony  was  left  behind 
on  the  island,  while  Columbus,  with  two  ships  left,  started 
back  for  Spain. 

On  the  way  great  storms  arose,  and  the  Pinta  went  down 
with  all  its  men.  Columbus  was  in  despair  because  he  thought 
his  ship  would  be  wrecked  too,  and  no  one  would  ever  know 
in  Spain  that  he  had  really  found  land  on  the  other  side  of 
the  Atlantic.  So  he  wrote  on  parchment  an  account  of  all 
his  adventures,  wrapped  it  up  in  a  waxed  cloth  so  that  water 
could  not  get  through  to  spoil  it,  and  put  it  in  a  barrel,  hoping 
that  it  would  be  washed  up  on  to  the  coast  of  Europe. 

But  he  got  safely  back  to  Spain  after  all.  As  he  sailed 
into  the  mouth  of  the  Tagus,  Bartholomew  Diaz,  the  other 
great  explorer,  went  on  board  to  talk  to  Columbus.  Then 
Columbus  went  to  Seville,  the  capital  of  Spain,  and  people 
crowded  to  see  him  riding  past  with  the  parrots  and  bright- 
coloured  birds  which  he  had  brought  back,  and  with  six 
natives  who  had  come  back  with  him  too. 

From  Seville  he  went  on  to  Barcelona,  where  he  was 
received  with  great  joy  by  the  king  and  queen.  Three  times 
more    Columbus    sailed  to  the   West   Indies,  and  once  he 


314  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

reached  South  America,  from  whence  he  brought  back  beau- 
tiful pearls. 

A  Spanish  town  called  Isabella  was  set  up  in  the  Island 
of  Hayti,  and  it  was  ruled  by  the  brother  of  Columbus. 
From  his  third  voyage  Columbus  was  brought  home  a 
prisoner  in  chains.  The  king  and  queen  had  heard  that  he 
had  been  unjust  to  the  settlers  and  cruel  to  the  natives,  but 
this  was  not  true.  When  Columbus,  now  a  white-haired  old 
man,  weary  and  worn,  threw  himself  weeping  at  her  feet, 
Isabella  knew  that  he  had  been  misjudged. 

Once  more  he  was  given  ships  and  sailors,  and  so  set  out 
on  his  fourth  voyage.  When  he  got  back  the  queen  was 
dead,  and  in  a  few  years  Columbus  died  too,  very  poor  and 
friendless  at  the  last  in  spite  of  the  great  work  he  had  done. 
He  died  at  the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth  century,  a  time  in 
which  the  great  results  of  his  discovery  were  to  be  seen. 
This  century  and  the  next  had  many  splendid  and  heroic 
sailors,  but  none  so  great  as  Columbus. 


CHAPTER   XXXI 

THE  REFORMATION 

At  the  end  of  the  Middle  Ages,  when  so  many  new  things 
were  happening  and  so  many  discoveries  were  being  made, 
some  people  began  to  have  new  ideas  about  the  Church  and 
religion  too,  and  in  time  this  led  to  the  great  religious  change 
which  was  known  as  the  Reformation. 

Just  as  poets,  and  painters,  and  sculptors  were  stirred  up 
with  new  ideas  about  beauty,  so  other  men  as  great,  or 
greater  in  their  own  way,  were  full  of  new  ideas  about 
goodness.  They  were  anxious  to  make  people  more  truly 
religious,  and  to  do  good  in  the  Church.  Most  of  these 
reformers  were  scholars  too. 

At  the  end  of  the  Middle  Ages,  though  many  people  were 
still  very  good,  there  was  not  any  very  great  holiness  in  the 
Church.  It  was  not  a  time  of  great  saints  like  the  twelfth 
or  thirteenth  century.  There  were  no  great  new  orders  of 
monks,  and  though  the  monasteries  of  the  old  orders  were 
spread  over  every  country  of  Europe,  the  monks  were  often 
not  nearly  so  strict  as  they  had  been  in  the  early  days  of  their 
orders.  A  few  monasteries  like  those  of  the  Carthusians  in 
England  were  just  as  strict  as  ever,  and  there  the  monks 
lived  just  as  St.  Bruno  had  taught  them  to  so  many  years 
before.  But  in  some  of  the  monasteries  the  monks  lived 
quite  wicked  lives.  Even  in  the  better  monasteries  many  of 
the  monks  did  not  know  very  much. 

The  reformers  thought  that  people  could  pray  and  serve 
God  better  if  they  were  better  educated.  They  wanted  to 
have  Greek  ^taught  in  the  schools  and  universities.     Some  of 


316 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


the  people  who  hated  changes  were  very  much  against  this 
'  new  learning '  of  the  Renaissance,  and  thought  that  the  '  old 
learning '  was  quite  enough.  Sometimes  at  Oxford  and 
Cambridge  the  students  would  actually  fight  among  them- 
selves about  this  question.  Those  who  wanted  Greek  to  be 
taught  were  called  in  fun  the  'Greeks,'  while  those  who 
wanted   the   '  old    learning '   were    called   the   *  Trojans,'  in 


EUROPEAN  DOMINIONS 

OP  

HENRY  fZg..,..-J""    ,;V     | 
FRANCiS  I,.^ 


r'"' 


MAP    OF    EUROPE,    SHOWING    THE    POSSESSIONS    OF    HENRY, 
FRANCIS,    AND    CHARLES 


memory  of  the  battles  of  the  Greeks  and  Trojans  in  the  early 
history  of  the  Greeks. 

One  of  the  first  and  greatest  of  the  reformers  in  England 
was  Sir  Thomas  More.  He  was  the  son  of  a  lawyer,  and  was 
born  in  Milk  Street,  London,  and  "v^ent  to  St.  Anthony's 
school  in  Threadneedle  Street.  While  he  was  still  a  young 
boy  he  became  a  page  in  the  house  of  Cardinal  Morton, 
the  archbishop  of  Canterbury.  In  those  days  the  sons  of 
gentlemen  often  became  pages  in  the  house  of  some  great 


THE  REFORMATION  317 

man,  so  as  to  learn  perfect  manners.  Already  More  was  very 
clever  and  witty,  and  the  cardinal  and  his  friends  guessed 
that  he  would  one  day  be  a  great  man. 

When  he  was  older  More  was  sent  to  the  university  at 
Oxford,  and  there  he  met  some  of  the  greatest  men  of  his 
time.  The  chief  of  them  was  a  priest  called  John  Colet,  who 
was  one  of  the  first  people  in  England  to  study  Greek.  He 
gave  lectures  at  Oxford  on  the  New  Testament,  the  part  of 
the  Bible  which  tells  us  about  the  Life  of  Our  Lord.  It  was 
written  first  in  Greek,  but  in  the  Middle  Ages  when  hardly 
any  one  knew  Greek  it  had  only  been  read  in  Latin,  the  great 
language  of  the  Church.  John  Colet  became  a  priest  of 
St.  Paul's  Cathedral  in  London,  and  he  set  up  a  school  for 
boys,  who  were  taught  the  new  learning,  and  brought  up 
to  be  very  good  and  religious  men.  Dean  Colet,  as  he  was 
called,  was  very  fond  of  these  boys,  and  we  may  still  read  a 
beautiful  letter  of  his  to  them,  in  which  he  begs  them  to  pray 
for  him,  saying  *  Lift  up  your  little  white  hands  to  God  for 
me.' 

Thomas  More  loved  John  Colet  very  dearly,  although 
Colet  was  older  than  he.  He  had,  too,  another  great  friend 
called  Erasmus,  who  was  about  the  same  age  as  himself. 
Erasmus  was  the  cleverest  man  of  his  time.  He  was  a 
priest,  but  the  only  thing  he  really  cared  for  was  learning. 
He  belonged  to  the  Low  Countries,  as  the  countries  which 
are  now  Holland  and  Belgium  were  then  called,  but  he 
travelled  about  from  one  country  to  another  always  studying 
and  writing.  He  was  very  witty,  and  people  roared  with 
laughter  when  they  read  his  books.  He  made  fun  of  all  the 
old  ways  and  the  people  of  the  *  old  learning,'  and  especially 
of  those  monks  and  people  who  were  against  the  new 
ideas. 

Colet  and  Erasmus  and  More  were  all  good  Catholics. 
They  never  thought  of  disobeying  the  Church,  or  saying  that 
the  Church's  teaching  was  wrong.  But  there  were  other 
reformers  who  were  quite  different,  and  who  rebelled  against 


318  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

the  Church.     These  were  the  first  Protestants,  and  it  was 
they  who  began  the  Reformation. 

Martin  Luther,  the  First  Great  Protestant 

Reformer 

The  first  and  greatest  of  all  the  Protestant  reformers  was 
Martin  Luther.  He  was  the  son  of  a  German  peasant  called 
Hans  Luther,  who  was  quite  poor  when  Martin  was  a  little 
boy,  but  became  richer  later  on.  Martin's  family  were  all 
good  people  in  their  way,  and  his  mother  taught  him  to  say 
his  prayers,  and  to  sing  the  beautiful  German  hymns  which 
the  people  then  sang. 

But  they  were  terribly  strict  and  severe,  and  even  his 
mother  would  beat  him  terribly  for  a  little  fault.  Once 
he  ran  away  from  home  after  his  father  had  punished  him 
cruelly,  and  even  when  he  was  brought  back  he  found  it 
very  hard  to  forgive  his  father.  It  was  perhaps  because  of 
his  sad  childhood  that  Luther  grew  up  into  rather  a  sad 
young  man,  always  worrying  about  his  sins,  and  hardly  able 
to  believe  that  God  would  forgive  them. 

He  was  sent  to  school  as  a  '  poor  scholar,'  and  was  fed  and 
taught  without  paying,  but  sang  in  the  choirs  of  the  churches 
to  which  the  schools  belonged.  Later  on  he  went  to  the 
town  of  Erfurt,  and  there  became  an  Augustinian  friar.  The 
Augustinians  were  one  of  the  orders  of  friars  which  were  set 
up  soon  after  the  Dominicans  and  Franciscans. 

Martin  Luther  studied  hard,  especially  the  Bible,  but  he 
did  not  care  much  for  Greek  or  the  'new  learning.'  After  a 
time  he  was  sent  to  lecture  on  theology  at  the  new  university 
of  Wittenberg,  which  had  been  set  up  by  the  ruler  of  Saxony, 
who  was  one  of  the  'Electors'  who  had  the  right  to  choose  the 
emperor. 

This  elector  was  called  Frederick  the  Wise.  At  this  time 
Germany  was  still  made  up  of  many  little  states,  each  ruled 
by  its   own   prince,   but  with   the  Emperor   over   all.     At 


THE  REFORMATION  319 

Wittenberg,  Luther  began  to  preach,  and  people  crowded  to 
hear  him,  because  of  the  simple  yet  strong  way  in  which  he 
spoke  to  them. 

At  this  time  there  were  things  going  on  in  the  Church 
which  Erasmus  and  the  other  reformers  did  not  like,  but 
which  Luther  made  up  his  mind  to  fight  against. 

The  Catholic  Church  taught  that  even  after  people  had 
had  their  sins  forgiven,  there  might  still  be  punishment  for 
them,  which  they  would  have  to  suffer  in  Purgatory  when 
they  died.  But  the  Church  said,  too,  that  this  punishment 
could  be  made  less,  or  taken  away  altogether,  if  people  said 
certain  prayers  or  did  good  works  for  this  reason.  Some- 
times '  indulgences,'  or  the  letting  off  from  punishment,  were 
promised  to  people  who  would  do  certain  things. 

Unfortunately  the  poor  people  who  were  not  educated 
sometimes  thought  that  they  could  really  buy  forgiveness  for 
their  sins.  They  did  not  really  understand  what  indulgences 
were.  Just  at  the  time  when  Luther  was  preaching  at 
Wittenberg,  a  Dominican  called  John  Tetzel  was  going 
about  Germany,  with  the  news  that  a  great  indulgence 
would  be  granted  to  any  one  who  gave  money  to  help  in  the 
building  of  the  church  of  St.  Peter's  at  Rome,  which  the 
popes  had  got  the  great  architect  Bramante  to  plan  for  them 
and  which  was  now  half  built.  It  was  a  magnificent  building 
of  great  size,  stretching  out  in  the  form  of  a  cross,  with  a 
wonderful  dome  over  the  part  where  the  arms  of  the  cross 
met. 

It  was  a  good  work  to  help  to  build  this  wonderful 
church,  but  Luther  and  other  people  were  shocked  at  the 
way  Tetzel  spoke  to  the  people  about  indulgences.  It 
seemed  to  them  that  he  was  trying  to  sell  forgiveness  of  sins, 
and  was  telling  lies  to  the  people  just  to  get  money  for  the 
Pope. 

Some  of  the  German  people  were  already  beginning  to 
have  much  less  respect  for  the  popes  than  they  had  had  in 
the  Middle  Ages.     Some  of  the  popes  in  the  second  part  of 


320 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


the  fifteenth  century  had  lived  very  dreadful  lives  indeed. 
Even  Pope  Leo  x.,  the  Pope  for  whom  John  Tetzel  was 
preaching  the  indulgences,  did  not  care  for  many  things 
except  pleasure,  although  he  was  not  a  wicked  man. 

So  when  Luther  began  to  preach  against  indulgences,  and 
to  say  that  it  was  wrong  of  the  Pope  to  allow  them  to  be 
preached  as  they  were,  there  were  already  many  people  who 

were   ready   to   listen    to 
him. 

Generally  the  preacher 
of  an  indulgence  was  re- 
ceived with  great  joy  at 
each  place  to  which  he 
came.  As  he  drew  near 
to  a  place  the  priests  and 
people  would  go  out  in  a 
procession  to  meet  him 
with  lighted  candles  and 
banners.  The  message 
from  the  Pope  giving  per- 
mission for  the  indulgence 
was  carried  on  a  cloth 
of  gold  and  velvet.  The 
church  bells  were  set  ring- 

(From  a  painting  by  his  friend,  Lucas  Cranach,  1529).    iuff ,     and     the    prCachcr    of 

the  indulgence  was  taken 
to  the  chief  church,  where  he  could  tell  the  people  all  about 
the  indulgence. 

To  Luther,  and  to  his  Elector  too,  this  all  seemed  just  like 
a  great  auction  sale.  Frederick  the  Wise  would  not  allow 
Tetzel  to  preach  his  indulgence  in  Saxony,  but  some  of  his 
people  went  to  the  nearest  place  in  other  states  where  they 
could  get  the  indulgence.  Some  of  them  crowded  back  to 
Wittenberg  with  the  papers  on  which  the  description  of  the 
indulgence  was  written  to  show  Luther. 

They  were  very  much  disappointed  when  he  told  them 


MARTIN    LUTHER 


THE  REFORMATION  321 

that  the  indulgences  were  no  good  to  them  at  all,  and  that 
no  pope  or  bishop  could  do  the  thing  that  they  promised 
when  they  gave  indulgences.  He  preached  against  them  to 
the  people,  and  at  last  he  wrote  down  on  a  paper  ninety-five 
reasons  for  not  believing  in  indulgences,  and  nailed  them  to 
the  door  of  the  Castle  Church  at  Wittenberg.  Copies  of  this 
paper  were  printed  off  as  quickly  as  the  university  printing 
press  could  do  them,  and  in  a  short  time  they  were  spread 
all  over  Germany. 

Everybody  was  very  much  excited.  Soon  afterwards 
Pope  Leo  sent  a  message  to  Luther  that  he  must  go  to 
Rome  and  give  an  account  of  what  he  had  done,  but  the 
Elector  persuaded  the  Pope  to  allow  Luther  to  be  tried 
by  the  Pope's  messenger,  or  Legate  as  he  was  called,  in 
Germany. 

When  Luther  stood  before  the  cardinal  Legate  at  the 
town  of  Augsburg,  he  was  told  that  he  must  immediately  say 
that  the  things  he  had  said  against  indulgences  were  not  true, 
but  he  declared  he  would  never  do  that.  He  felt  that  he 
had  spoken  what  he  thought  was  the  truth,  and  he  could 
not  now  say  differently.  So  he  went  back  home,  and  the 
cardinal  went  back  to  the  Pope  to  tell  him  how  the  German 
peasant  monk  had  defied  him. 

For  two  years  the  question  was  not  settled,  and  then 
the  Pope  sent  a  message  to  Luther  telling  him  that  he  was 
excommunicated,  and  no  longer  belonged  to  the  Church. 
But  by  this  time  Luther  had  begun  not  to  believe  any  longer 
that  the  Pope  ought  to  be  head  of  the  Church.  At  first  he 
had  certainly  not  meant  to  rebel  against  the  Pope,  but  as 
the  struggle  went  on,  he  grew  more  and  more  angry  with 
the  terrible  anger  he  had  inherited  from  his  father,  and  in 
the  end  he  made  up  his  mind  to  rebel  against  the  Pope  and 
to  get  as  many  people  as  he  could  to  follow  him. 

He  showed  how  little  he  cared  for  the  Pope  when  he 
got  a  great  bonfire  lighted  outside  the  walls  of  Witten- 
berg, and   burnt   the  Pope's   message   there   before   all  the 

X 


322  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

people.  As  the  flames  rose  up,  Luther's  friends  gave  a  great 
shout. 

This  was  the  beginning  of  Protestantism,  by  which  half 
the  people  of  Europe  broke  away  from  the  Pope  and  set  up 
religions  of  their  own.  It  was  the  greatest  change  in  history 
since  the  coming  of  Christianity  into  Europe,  and  it  is  very 
strange  to  remember  that  it  was  the  preaching  of  one  German 
peasant  which  brought  it  about.  Still  the  Reformation 
would  never  have  come  if  people  had  not  already  begun  to 
get  used  to  many  new  ideas  which  were  brought  to  them  by 
the  Renaissance. 

As  time  went  on,  Luther  said  that  many  other  things 
which  the  Church  taught  were  not  true.  He  said  that 
there  were  not  seven  sacraments,  but  only  three,  and  later 
on  he  said  there  were  only  two.  Many  people  listened 
eagerly  to  his  teaching. 

All  the  friars  of  his  monastery  at  Wittenberg  gave  up 
their  monastic  life  and  went  out  to  live  in  the  world  again. 
Many  of  them  got  married,  as  Luther  himself  did.  He  now 
hated  monks  and  monasteries  and  nearly  everything  belonging 
to  the  Catholic  Church.  He  wrote  many  books  against  the 
Pope. 

In  those  days  people  who  disagreed  about  any  subject 
thought  nothing  of  calling  each  other  dreadful  names  in 
their  books,  and  Luther  was  even  more  violent  than  the 
other  people  of  his  time  in  this  way. 

Luther  told  the  people  that  there  was  really  no  need  of 
priests,  that  people  could  save  their  souls  only  by  really 
believing  in  Jesus  Christ.  He  told  them,  too,  that  it  was 
not  true,  as  the  Church  taught,  that  in  the  mass  the  bread 
and  wine  which  the  priest  consecrated  were  changed  into 
the  Body  and  Blood  of  Christ,  which  were  received  by  the 
people  who  went  to  communion,  but  still  he  said  that  Christ 
was  really  present  in  the  Sacrament.  Above  all,  he  told  the 
people  that  they  should  read  for  themselves  the  words  of 
Our  Lord  in  the  New  Testament,  and  he  himself  translated 


THE  REFORMATION  328 

the  Bible  into  German,  so  that  the  people  might  read  it  for 
themselves. 

Many  of  the  German  princes  were  pleased  with  Luther's 
teaching,  because  they  were  able  to  take  the  money  and 
lands  of  the  monasteries  which  were  broken  up. 

The  Emperor  Charles  v.  was  against  the  Protestants,  but 
in  the  end  he  had  to  agree  that  each  prince  should  settle 
the  religion  of  his  state  for  himself.  About  half  the  states, 
chiefly  those  in  the  North,  became  Protestant,  while  the 
other  half  remained  Catholic.  One  half  of  Saxony,  under 
Duke  George,  was  Catholic,  while  the  other  half,  under 
Luther's  friend,  the  Elector  Frederick,  became  Protestant. 

There  was  a  great  deal  of  discontent  and  unhappiness 
at  the  time  in  Germany,  and  all  these  changes  made  the 
people  ready  to  rebel.  The  towns,  many  of  which  became 
Protestant,  were  rich  because  the  early  sixteenth  century 
was  a  time  in  which  trade  was  growing,  but  in  the  country 
the  poorer  gentlemen  who  were  called  the  Knights  were 
growing  poorer.  Now  they  thought  that  they  could  become 
Protestants,  fight  against  the  rich  Catholic  princes,  and 
especially  the  bishops  who  ruled  over  some  of  the  German 
states.  They  fought  what  was  known  as  the  Knights'  War, 
but  they  were  defeated. 

Then  the  peasants  in  Germany  rose  in  revolt,  but  they 
were  put  down  also.  Thousands  of  people  were  killed,  and 
there  was  terrible  misery  in  the  country.  Many  of  these 
people  said  they  were  doing  what  Luther  had  taught  them, 
but  he  would  not  have  anything  to  do  with  them.  Once  he 
had  started  the  Reformation  he  really  left  it  to  itself  and 
did  not  become  a  leader  who  could  give  commands  to  the 
people  like  other  reformers  did,  but  settled  down  to  his 
writing  at  Wittenberg.  He  said,  in  fact,  that  the  people 
should  take  the  religion  given  to  them  by  their  princes,  and 
this  is  what  soon  happened  in  Germany,  so  that  there  were 
almost  as  many  kinds  of  Protestantism  as  there  were 
Protestant  states. 


324  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

The  Great  Kings  of  the  Renaissance 

Charles  v.,  who  became  Emperor  the  year  after  Luther 
had  begun  his  fight  against  indulgences,  was  a  young  man. 
He  belonged  to  the  family  of  the  Hapsburgs,  who  were 
the  rulers  of  Austria.  It  had  now  become  the  custom 
for  these  rulers  to  be  elected  emperor.  But  the  young 
Emperor  Charles  v.  had  many  other  lands  to  rule  over  too. 
From  his  grandmother  he  had  the  Low  Countries  and  the 
Free  County  of  Burgundy,  that  part  of  Burgundy. which  had 
not  been  won  by  the  kings  of  France.  From  his  mother, 
Joanna  the  Mad,  the  daughter  of  Ferdinand  and  Isabella,  he 
had  inherited  Spain  and  all  the  Spanish  possessions,  which  were 
very  great. 

Soon  after  he  was  made  Emperor,  Charles  gave  up  Austria 
and  the  kingdoms  of  Hungary  and  Bohemia  to  his  brother 
Ferdinand,  but  still  he  had  an  immense  empire.  If  only 
Charles  could  have  governed  Germany  strongly,  he  would 
soon  have  been  the  strongest  king  in  Europe ;  but  it  was 
very  difficult  to  govern  Germany,  and  the  Reformation,  which 
divided  the  princes  still  more  against  each  other,  made  it  more 
so.  There  were  other  kings  who  were  watching  Charles 
carefully  for  fear  he  should  be  too  strong. 

France  was  now  a  strong  and  united  nation  under  another 
young  king,  Francis  i.  England  had  almost  forgotten  the 
Wars  of  the  Roses,  and  was  becoming  a  strong  and  important 
country  under  its  second  Tudor  king,  Henry  viii.,  who  was 
also  a  young  man  at  this  time. 

Both  Francis  i.  and  Henry  viii.  were  handsome  men  at  this 
time,  though  they  both  became  very  ugly  through  too  much 
self-indulgence  as  they  grew  older.  They  were  both  clever, 
but  vain.  They  were  both  self-willed  too,  and  got  things  very 
much  their  own  way  in  the  countries  they  ruled.  In  England 
the  parliament  was  hardly  ever  called  now  to  give  advice,  and 
when  it  was  it  did  very  much  what  the  king  told  it  to. 

Charles  v.  and  Francis  i.  were  enemies  from  the  beginning. 


rr;!? 


THE  REFORMATION  325 

and  they  were  each  anxious  to  get  Henry  viii.'s  help  in 
fighting  the  other.  It  was  to  talk  over  this  question  that 
Henry  met  Francis  in  the  North  of  France,  when  both  kings 
dressed  themselves  and  their  servants  so  magnificently  that 
the  meeting  was  ever  afterwards  called  the  'Field  of  the  Cloth 
of  Gold.'  In  spite  of  this,  Henry  afterwards  helped  Charles 
in  his  battles  against  the  French  king.  A  great  deal  of  the 
fighting  was  done  in  Italy,  for  both  Francis  and  Charles  said 
that  certain  parts  of  Italy  ought  to  belong  to  them. 

Although  the  greater  Italian  states  were  rich,  and  the 
palaces  of  their  Renaissance  princes  very  beautiful,  they  were 
w^eak  just  because  there  were  so  many  of  them.  They  were 
jealous  of  one  another,  and  could  not  all  join  against  enemies 
like  Francis  or  Charles.  Instead,  when  they  quarrelled  among 
themselves,  some  prince  was  sure  to  ask  help  from  France  or 
Germany,  although  they  were  sorry  for  it  afterwards  when 
they  saw  the  misery  which  the  foreign  soldiers  brought  to  Italy. 

In  one  of  the  quarrels  between  Francis  and  Charles,  the 
Pope,  Clement  vii.,  took  the  part  of  the  French.  The  Emperor, 
though  he  was  such  a  good  Catholic,  let  his  army  march 
against  Rome.  Many  of  his  soldiers  were  followers  of  Luther, 
and  hated  everything  belonging  to  the  old  Church.  They 
made  a  terrible  attack  on  Rome,  burning  and  killing  and 
robbing,  turning  priests  and  nuns,  children  and  old  people, 
into  the  streets,  and  torturing  them  with  the  greatest  cruelty. 
The  Pope  shut  himself  up  in  the  castle  of  St.  Angelo,  but  at 
last  got  the  terrible  foreign  soldiers  to  go  away  by  promising 
to  pay  a  great  deal  of  money  to  the  Emperor.  Rome  never 
seemed  quite  so  great  and  beautiful  again,  after  the  terrible 
destruction  of  this  time.     It  happened  in  the  year  1527. 

Indeed,  this  seemed  to  be  the  end  of  the  greatest  time  of 
the  Renaissance.  A  sort  of  sadness  came  to  Italy  with  these 
terrible  wars.  There  were  nearly  always  foreigners  fighting 
over  some  part  of  her  land,  and  there  was  no  longer  the  great 
joyfulness  which  seemed  to  fill  Italy  in  the  days  of  the 
Renaissance.     The  great  ^lichael  Angelo  lived  and  worked 


326  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

on  far  into  the  sixteenth  century,  but  he  was  the  last  of  the 
really  great  artists,  and  there  is  a  sadness  in  his  work.  The 
artists  who  came  after  imitated  the  earlier  painters  and 
sculptors,  and  were  not  nearly  so  great. 

All  through  the  early  years  of  the  sixteenth  century,  the 
Protestants  were  preaching  and  teaching  not  only  in  Germany 
but  in  the  other  countries  of  Europe.  We  must  see  what 
happened  to  them,  and  which  countries  became  Protestant 
and  which  remained  Catholic. 


The  Reformation  in   England 

In  England  at  first  people  took  very  little  notice  of  the 
new  German  reformers,  but  neither  did  they  take  much  notice 
of  the  Catholic  reformers  like  Colet  and  Sir  Thomas  More, 
who  wanted  to  make  the  Church  better  but  would  not  rebel. 
This  made  some  of  the  young  scholars  from  Oxford  and 
Cambridge  feel  inclined  to  follow  Luther  and  his  friends. 
Some  of  them  went  over  to  Germany  to  listen  to  the  teaching 
of  the  reformers  there,  and  then  in  a  few  years  came  back 
Protestants,  and  anxious  to  make  all  England  Protestant 
too. 

King  Henry  viii.  was  a  clever  man,  and  he  was  proud  of 
the  fact  that  he  knew  as  much  about  religion  and  theology  as 
most  priests.  When  Martin  Luther  taught  that  there  were 
only  two  sacraments,  Baptism  and  the  Holy  Eucharist, 
Henry  wrote  a  book  against  him,  trying  to  prove  that  there 
were  seven  sacraments  just  as  the  Church  taught.  Pope 
Leo  X.  was  so  pleased  with  this  book,  that  he  said  that 
Henry  should  be  called  '  Defender  of  the  Faith,'  and  all 
English  kings  and  queens  have  kept  this  title  ever  since, 
although  most  of  them  have  been  Protestant.  The  letters 
*  F.  D.'  after  the  name  of  the  king  or  queen  are  always  still 
to  be  seen  on  English  money. 

The  early  Protestant  reformers  were  always  anxious  to 
print  the  Bible  in  the  language  of  their  own  country,  so  that 


THE  REFORMATION 


327 


all  the  people  might  read  it  for  themselves.  They  thought 
that  the  people  could  learn  much  more  from  the  Bible  than 
from  any  Church.  One  of  the  young  Protestant  reformers, 
who  had  been  to  Germany  and  come  back,  translated  the 
New  Testament  into  English  and  had  it  printed,  but  the  king 
had  all  the  copies  that  could 
be  found  burnt  before  all  the 
people  at  St.  Paul's  Cross  in 
London. 

Sir  Thomas  More  wrote 
against  Tyndale,  and  Tyndale 
thought  it  would  be  safer  to 
flee  away  to  the  Low  Coun- 
tries. For  according  to  the 
law,  heretics  were  to  be  burned 
to  death.  We  shall  see  how, 
a  little  later,  hundreds  and 
thousands  of  both  Catholics 
and  Protestants  were  killed 
for  believing  in  their  religions. 
It  was  not  for  many  years 
that  people  learnt  toleration, 
that  is,  to  allow  people  to 
believe  what  they  liked. 

Meanwhile  the  rulers  of 
the  Protestant  states  killed 
the  Catholics,  and  the  rulers 
of  the  Catholic  states  killed 
the  Protestants,  and  there  was  terrible  misery  everywhere. 

Although  Henry  viii.  was  so  strong  a  Catholic  at  first,  it 
was  not  many  years  before  England  became  Protestant. 
When  he  found  that  the  Pope  would  not  give  him 
something  he  wanted,  Henry  turned  against  him  and  began 
to  believe  like  Luther,  or  pretended  to  believe,  that  the  Pope 
had  no  right  to  be  head  of  the  Church. 

The  thing  which  Henry  wanted  was  a  divorce  from  his 


HENRY    VIII.    ON    HIS    THRONE 

(From  a  painting  by  Holbein,  who  was  court 
painter  to  Henry). 


328 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


wife,  the  good  queen,  Catharine  of  Aragon.  Catharine  was 
a  Spanish  princess,  who  had  been  married  to  Henry  many 
years  when  he  first  began  to  think  of  a  divorce.  She  had 
only  one  child,  the  little  Princess  INIary,  and  Henry  would 
have  liked  to  have  a  son  to  be  king  after  him.     He  said  that 


HOW    A    TOWN    WAS    BESIEGED    IN    THE    SIXTEENTH    CENTURY 

(From  a  very  old  painting  of  the  siege  of  Boulogne  by  Henry  viii.  in  1544.     Cannon, 

protected  by  great  barrels,  and  archers  attacked  the  town  at  the  same  time  ;  but  in 

those  early  days  of  gunpowder  the  arrows  probably  did  nearly  as  much  damage  to 

the  citizens  as  the  cannon-balls). 


he  thought  that  there  was  no  blessing  on  his  marriage 
because  Catharine  had  been  married  first  to  Henry's  brother, 
who  had  died  in  a  few  months  while  he  was  still  quite  a 
boy.  The  Church  did  not  allow  a  woman  to  marry  the 
brother  of  her  dead  husband,  but  the  Pope  had  given 
permission  for  the  marriage  of  Henry  and  Catharine. 


THE  REFORMATION  329 

Now,  Henry  wanted  the  Pope  to  say  that  there  had  not 
really  been  any  marriage,  so  that  he  could  send  Catharine 
away  and  marry  again.  But  the  Pope  would  not.  Henry's 
chief  adviser  was  the  great  Cardinal  Wolsey.  He  had  done 
everything  he  could  to  please  the  king.  Indeed,  he  said 
afterwards  as  he  lay  dying  that  he  wished  he  had  served  God 
as  well  as  he  had  served  the  king.  But  when  he  could  not 
get  the  Pope  to  give  him  the  divorce,  Henry  turned  against 
the  cardinal,  and  sent  him  away  from  the  court.  Afterwards, 
when  the  cardinal  was  at  York,  Henry  sent  for  him  to  go  to 
London  to  be  tried  for  treason,  which  meant  plotting  against 
the  king.  Henry  must  have  known  that  this  was  not  true. 
Wolsey  was  very  ill  when  the  message  reached  him,  and  he 
died  on  the  journey. 

It  was  a  very  terrible  thing  about  King  Henry  viii.  that 
he  was  never  grateful  to  anybody,  but  turned  against  his  best 
friends  as  soon  as  they  were  no  longer  useful  to  him. 

Henry  then  said  that  the  Pope  really  had  no  right  to 
judge  in  cases  which  came  up  in  England,  and  he  got 
Cranmer,  archbishop  of  Canterbury,  to  give  him  the  divorce. 
Queen  Catharine  was  sent  away,  and  Henry  married  a  young 
and  pretty  lady  of  the  court  called  Anne  Boleyn.  Soon 
afterwards  he  got  the  parliament  to  declare  that  he  was 
'  Supreme  Head  on  earth  of  the  Church  of  England,'  and 
that  any  one  who  would  not  agree  to  this  was  guilty  of  treason 
and  should  be  put  to  death.  So  in  quite  a  different  way 
from  the  German  states  which  followed  Luther,  England 
became  Protestant  too. 

Most  of  the  English  people  changed  their  religion  with 
the  king,  but  many  of  the  best  people  would  not.  The 
monks  of  the  Carthusian  monastery  in  London  were  asked 
to  take  the  oath  of  supremacy,  that  is,  to  swear  to  take  the 
king  as  head  of  the  Church,  but  many  of  them  would  not,  and 
so  they  were  put  to  death  in  a  very  terrible  way.  Then  Sir 
Thomas  More,  who  had  been  Chancellor  of  England,  but  had 
given  up  his  post,  and  Fisher,  bishop  of  Rochester,  who  had 


330  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

preached  against  the  king's  doings,  were  sent  for  to  go  before 
Archbishop  Cranmer  at  his  palace  at  Lambeth.  There  they 
were  to  swear  to  agree  that  the  children  of  the  new  queen 
had  a  right  to  have  their  father's  crown  after  his  death.  A 
little  daughter,  who  was  afterwards  Queen  Elizabeth,  had 
been  born. 

More  and  Fisher  were  also  asked  to  take  the  oath  of 
supremacy.  They  would  not  do  this,  though  they  were  both 
quite  ready  to  swear  to  be  faithful  to  Henry  and  to  the 
children  of  Anne  Boleyn.  The  king  might  have  been  pleased 
with  this,  but  Anne  was  very  spiteful  against  More  and 
Fisher  and  persuaded  the  king  to  have  them  put  to  death. 
So  they  both  had  their  heads  cut  off. 

It  is  said  that  More  joked  even  on  the  scaffold.  He  was 
a  very  brave  man.  He  had  lived  a  splendid  life,  and  he  was 
not  afraid  to  die.  His  beard  had  grown  while  he  was  in  prison, 
and  as  he  laid  his  head  on  the  block,  he  put  it  to  one  side  say- 
ing :  '  Pity  that  should  be  cut :  it  has  not  committed  treason.' 

Yet  at  the  same  time  King  Henry  did  not  like  the 
Protestant  teaching  any  more  than  before.  Before  the  death 
of  the  Carthusians  and  of  More  and  Fisher,  for  their  clinging 
to  the  Pope,  Protestant  reformers  had  already  been  burnt  for 
teaching  the  new  doctrines. 

The  first  who  died  for  Protestantism  in  England  was  a 
Cambridge  man  called  Thomas  Bilney.  He  was  a  simple, 
gentle  person  and  his  friends  called  him  '  Little  Bilney,'  but 
Henry  was  very  angry  because  he  taught,  like  Luther,  the 
people  could  save  their  souls  through  Faith  alone.  Before 
the  end  of  his  reign  Henry  had  had  many  people,  both 
Catholics  and  Protestants,  killed  for  their  faith.  He  would 
not  let  the  people  keep  their  Catholic  religion,  but  he  would 
not  let  them  become  too  Protestant. 

John  Forest,  a  friar  and  a  friend  of  Queen  Catharine,  was 
burnt  in  a  fire  made  of  a  wooden  image  of  a  saint  brought 
from  Wales.  For  Henry  was  against  the  use  of  images,  and 
had  them  destroyed  wherever  he  could. 


THE  REFORMATION  331 

He  got  rid,  too,  of  all  the  monasteries  all  over  England. 
The  monks  and  nuns  were  turned  out  and  their  property  was 
taken  by  the  king.  Sometimes  the  beautiful  churches  and 
buildings  of  the  monasteries  were  given  to  the  king's  friends. 
Many  of  them  fell  into  ruin.  Some  of  the  monks  who  gave 
in  easily  were  given  money  by  the  king.  Others  were  turned 
out  with  nothing  to  live  on.     Some  were  put  to  death. 

The  poor  people  whom  the  monks  had  fed  and  clothed 
now  became  poorer  still,  and  many  people  were  angry  that 
the  monks  should  be  treated  so  badly.  In  the  North  of 
England  the  people  rose  in  a  rebellion  which  was  called  the 
Pilgrimage  of  Grace,  but  it  was  easily  put  down.  The  new 
lords  who  got  the  monks'  lands  were  often  not  so  kind  to  the 
people  who  lived  on  the  land  as  the  monks  had  been,  and 
there  was  a  great  deal  of  misery  among  the  country  people 
by  the  end  of  Henry's  reign. 

When  Henry  died  his  son  Edward,  who  was  only  a  boy, 
became  king.  He  was  fond  of  the  Protestants,  and  during 
his  short  reign  England  became  much  more  Protestant.  But 
Edward  vi.  did  not  live  long. 

After  him  his  sister  Mary,  the  daughter  of  Queen 
Catharine  of  Aragon,  became  queen.  Edward  had  been  the 
son  of  Henry's  third  wife,  for  Anne  Boleyn  had  had  her  head 
cut  off  because  the  king  said  she  was  not  faithful  to  him. 
Henry  had  six  wives  altogether,  and  another  besides  Anne 
Boleyn  had  her  head  cut  off. 

Queen  Mary  made  England  Catholic  again,  though  she 
could  not  get  the  people  who  had  the  monks'  lands  to  give 
them  up  again.  Most  of  the  people  seemed  to  be  quite 
pleased  to  become  Catholic  once  more,  but  the  people  who 
really  believed  in  Protestantism  would  not.  So  Queen  Mary 
had  them  burnt.  Although  she  was  a  good  queen,  she 
thought  it  was  her  duty  to  do  this. 

Among  others.  Archbishop  Cranmer,  the  great  archbishop 
who  had  helped  Henry  viii.  so  much,  was  burnt  too.  He 
had  been  very  frightened  in  prison,  and  had  signed  a  paper 


332  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

saying  that  he  did  not  believe  in  the  Protestant  rehgion,  but 
when  he  knew  he  was  to  be  burnt  all  the  same  he  was  sorry  he 
had  done  this,  and  when  he  was  tied  to  the  stake  to  be  burnt  he 
plunged  his  hand  into  the  flames,  saying  that  his  hand  should 
be  burnt  first  because  he  had  done  this  wrong  thing  with  it. 

Queen  Mary  did  not  live  long.  She  died  broken-hearted 
at  the  way  she  was  left  alone  by  her  husband,  the  great  King 
Philip  of  Spain,  who  had  married  her  because  he  wanted  the 
English  people  to  help  him  in  his  wars.  They  would  not 
help  him,  and  as  he  did  not  really  love  INIary  he  left  her  and 
stayed  at  home  in  Spain. 

When  Queen  Mary  died,  Elizabeth,  the  daughter  of 
Henry  viii.  and  Anne  Boleyn,  became  queen,  and  England 
became  Protestant  once  more.  This  time  it  was  really 
Protestant,  and  all  through  Elizabeth's  long  reign,  which  was 
a  very  great  and  glorious  reign  in  many  ways,  the  Catholics 
were  hunted  out.  Priests  who  were  found  in  England  hiding 
so  that  they  could  say  mass  for  the  Catholics  were  put  to  a 
very  terrible  death,  while  all  Catholics  had  to  pay  great  fines 
for  not  going  to  church,  and  even  the  Catholic  noblemen  and 
gentlemen  became  very  poor.  Many  of  them  sent  their  sons 
to  Catholic  countries  to  be  educated,  although  this,  too,  was 
forbidden. 

Yet  Ehzabeth  also  was  against  the  people  who  were  too 
Protestant.  She  punished  the  Puritans,  as  the  people  were 
called  who  at  the  end  of  her  reign  were  trying  to  do  away 
with  the  ceremonies  which  made  the  English  Church  seem  to 
them  too  Catholic.  Some  Puritans  who  wrote  books  about 
these  things  had  their  hands  cut  off  or  their  ears  slit.  Some 
were  even  put  to  death.  For  Elizabeth  was  in  many  things 
very  like  her  father,  Henry  viii.,  and  she  was  determined  that 
the  people  should  do  things  just  as  she  told  them. 

Queen  Elizabeth  and  Maky  Queen  of  Scots 
Scotland  became  Protestant  too,   although  its   beautiful 
young  queen,  Msny  Queen  of  Scots,  was  a  Catholic.    Mary  had 


THE  REFORMATION 


333 


been  brought  up  in  France,  and  had  been  married  to  the  young 
French  king,  Francis  ii.,  but  he  had  died  and  she  came  back 
to  Scotland  soon  after  Elizabeth  became  queen  of  England. 
But  the  Protestant  Scottish  nobles  turned  against  her,  and  the 
great  Protestant  preacher  John  Knox  preached  against  her, 
calling  her  terrible  names. 

Mary  did  some  foolish  things  which  gave  her  enemies  the 
chance  of  doing  her  harm.  She  was  shut  up  in  the  castle  of 
Lochleven,  but  was  helped  by 
a  young  page  to  escape.  The 
Catholic  nobles  helped  her  to 
fight  her  enemies,  but  she  lost 
the  battle  and  fled  into  England, 
hoping  that  Elizabeth  would  help 
her. 

But  Elizabeth  had  always 
been  very  jealous  of  Mary  be- 
cause of  her  beauty.  Mary  Queen 
of  Scots  had  very  beautiful 
golden-brown  hair  and  a  fair 
complexion.  She  had  lovely 
brown  e57^es,  and  was  very  grace- 
ful and  charming.  Elizabeth, 
who  was  very  vain,  was  not  nearly 
so  beautiful,  and  this  was  one 
reason  for  which  she  had  always  disliked  Mary 
years  she  kept  her  shut  up  in  prison. 

The  English  Catholics  thought  that  Mary  had  a  better 
right  to  the  throne  of  England  than  Elizabeth,  and  some  of 
them  plotted  to  kill  Elizabeth  and  make  Mary  queen  of 
England.  The  plot  was  found  out,  and  the  plotters  were  put 
to  death.  Elizabeth  said  that  Mary  had  known  about  it  all, 
and  had  her  put  on  trial  and  in  the  end  put  to  death. 

When  Queen  Mary,  dressed  in  crimson,  walked  on  to  the 
platform  in  the  great  hall  at  the  Palace  of  Fotheringay,  where 
she  was  to  be  killed,  she  was  an  old  woman.     Her  golden 


MARY    QUEEN    OF    SCOTS 

(From  a  portrait  by  a  famous  French  painter 

named  Clouet,  painted  when  the  queen  was 

in  mourning  as  a  widow). 


For  nineteen 


334 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


hair  had  become  white  in  the  long  years  she  had  been  in 
prison.  But  she  was  still  beautiful,  and  she  died  very  bravely, 
comforting  the  women  who  were  with  her  and  who  were 
crying. 

John  Knox  and  the  Scottish  Protestants  were  not 
Lutherans.  They  were  followers  of  the  great  French  re- 
former John  Calvin.  King  Francis  i.  began  to  persecute  the 
Protestant  reformers  as  soon  as  they  appeared  in  France,  and 

when  he  died  the  kings  who  came 
after  him  did  the  same,  and 
France  always  remained  Catholic. 
But  there  were  always  some  Pro- 
testants in  France,  although  later 
on,  as  we  shall  see,  the  Protes- 
tants suffered  more  terribly  there 
than  in  any  other  country. 

John  Calvin  was  one  of  the 
early  French  Protestants,  but  he 
fled    away    to    Switzerland    and 
there  became  one  of  the  greatest 
Protestant  leaders.      Switzerland 
became    almost   altogether    Pro- 
testant,    though    a    few    of    its 
cantons,    as    its    divisions    were 
called,  remained   Catholic.     The 
city  of  Geneva,  which  had  been 
before  governed  by  a  bishop,  gave  itself  up  to  Calvin,  and  he 
governed  it  in  his  own  way.    Protestants  from  all  over  Europe 
travelled  to  Geneva  to  hear  his  teaching. 

He  taught  very  different  things  from  Luther.  He  did 
not  believe  at  all  that  Christ  was  present  in  the  Holy 
Eucharist.  He  taught,  too,  that  men  had  no  free  will, 
that  is,  that  people  cannot  really  choose  whether  they 
will  be  good  or  bad,  and  that  even  before  a  person  is  born 
he  or  she  is  destined  to  go  to  heaven  or  hell  after  their 
death. 


JOHN    CALVIN 

One  of  the  greatest  Protestant  Reformers. 


THE  REFORMATION  335 

This  seems  a  very  terrible  teaching,  and  it  might  seem 
that  the  people  who  believed  it  might  think  it  v\^ould  not 
really  matter  how  they  behaved.  But  this  was  not  so.  Still 
the  Calvinists  were  often  rather  sad  and  gloomy  people,  and 
there  was  not  much  joy  in  their  rehgion.  But  they  loved 
it  dearly,  and  fought  for  it  with  their  lives. 

The  French  Protestants  were  Calvinists,  and  so  were  the 
Protestants  in  the  Low  Countries.  In  both  places  they  were 
terribly  persecuted.  The  year  before  Francis  i.  died,  three 
thousand  Protestants  were  killed  in  Provence  in  the  South  of 
France.  The  South  was  always  the  Protestant  part  of  France, 
just  as  it  was  the  part  where  there  had  been  most  heresy  in 
the  Middle  Ages.  In  spite  of  persecution,  the  Protestant 
religion  grew  strong  in  the  South  of  France.  The  great 
nobles  there  became  Protestant,  and  were  always  ready  to 
fight  their  Catholic  king. 

So  strong  did  the  Protestants  become,  that  they  were 
able  to  fight  hard  battles  against  the  Catholics,  and  during 
the  second  half  of  the  sixteenth  century  there  were  the  most 
terrible  civil  wars,  in  which  Frenchmen  fought  against 
Frenchmen  because  of  their  differences  in  religion. 

The  chief  ruler  in  France  in  the  second  part  of  the 
sixteenth  century  was  Catherine  de  Medici,  one  of  the 
Medici  family  which  ruled  in  Florence.  She  was  married 
to  Henry  ii.,  who  was  king  of  France  after  Francis  i. 
While  her  husband  was  alive  she  had  very  little  power 
in  France,  but  when  he  died  she  ruled  the  country  for 
her  sons,  who  were  very  delicate,  and  died  one  after  the 
other. 

It  was  the  eldest,  Francis  ii.,  who  was  the  husband  of 
Mary  Queen  of  Scots,  and  it  was  when  he  died  that  Mary 
went  back  to  Scotland. 

Catherine  loved  power  above  all  things.  Just  like  many 
Italian  princes  of  that  time,  she  would  do  anything  to  keep 
it.  She  seemed  never  to  think  whether  a  thing  was  good  or 
bad  to  do,  but  only  whether  it  would  help  her  to  keep  power. 


336  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

It  was  this  which  led  her  to  make  a  most  terrible  attack  on 
the  Protestants  of  France. 

At  first  she  tried  to  keep  the  Catholics  and  Protestants 
fairly  equal  in  power,  and  she  invited  the  Admiral  Coligny 
to  the  court.  He  was  the  chief  Protestant  nobleman  in 
France.  Catherine's  son,  Charles  ix.,  a  young  boy,  was  king 
at  this  time.  But  Catherine  soon  saw  that  her  son  had  taken 
a  great  liking  for  the  brave  old  admiral,  and  she  began  to  be 
afraid  that  Coligny  would  get  power  over  the  boy  and  her 
own  power  would  grow  less. 

She  had  arranged,  too,  that  her  daughter,  Margaret, 
should  marry  another  Protestant,  the  handsome  young  King 
Henry  of  Navarre.  The  French  part  of  the  kingdom  of 
Navarre  is  on  the  borders  of  France  and  Spain.  The 
wedding  was  to  be  a  very  splendid  one.  It  was  in  the 
summer  of  the  year  1572.  Even  the  Catholics  of  Paris 
could  not  help  liking  the  young  Henry  with  his  pleasant 
ways  and  his  charming  smile. 

On  the  wedding  day  he  was  dressed  in  pale  yellow  satin, 
ornamented  with  silver  and  pearls,  and  there  was  a  wonderful 
procession  of  bishops  and  cardinals  and  knights.  For  three 
days  there  was  feasting  and  gaiety  in  Paris,  but  the  Queen 
Mother  got  a  man  to  shoot  at  the  admiral  in  the  streets, 
hoping  to  kill  him.  The  shot  did  not  kill  the  admiral,  but 
blew  off  one  of  his  fingers.  No  one  knew  who  had  given  the 
order,  but  the  Huguenots,  as  the  French  Protestants  were 
called,  were  very  angry,  and  Charles  was  full  of  anxiety.  But 
his  mother  told  him  that  the  Protestants  must  be  killed,  and 
especially  the  admiral. 

The  poor  boy  hated  the  idea,  but  he  was  very  weak  and 
used  to  doing  what  his  mother  ordered.  At  last  he  cried  out 
that  if  the  admiral  was  to  be  killed  then  all  the  Huguenots 
in  France  should  die  too,  so  that  there  would  be  none  left  to 
reproach  him. 

Catherine  was  only  too  pleased  at  this  idea.  She  gave 
secret  orders  that  the  Huguenots  throughout  France  should 


THE  REFORMATION  337 

be  killed.  The  thing  was  to  be  done  suddenly  and  quietly- 
one  summer  night,  and  so  it  was.  In  Paris  and  all  over 
France  the  Huguenots  were  suddenly  attacked  and  killed  in 
thousands. 

Admiral  Coligny  was  thrown  by  a  servant  from  a  window 
and  fell  dead  in  the  street  below.  The  massacre  took  place 
on  the  night  before  the  Feast  of  St.  Bartholomew,  and  was 
ever  afterwards  called  the  Massacre  of  St.  Bartholomew. 
Henry  of  Navarre  was  not  killed  because  he  was  the  queen's 
son-in-law. 

All  the  Protestants  in  Europe  were  full  of  surprise  and 
anger  at  this  terrible  massacre.  The  young  king,  Charles  ix., 
could  never  forget  it  himself.  He  died  two  years  afterwards, 
full  of  horror  still  at  the  memory  of  it.  Catherine's  favourite 
son  then  became  king  as  Henry  iii.  He  was  killed  in  1589, 
a  few  months  after  the  death  of  his  mother,  who  kept  power 
to  the  last. 

All  during  this  time  there  were  still  miserable  struggles 
between  the  Catholics  and  Protestants.  A  new  and  better 
time  came  when  Henry  iii.  died,  and  after  some  years  of  fight- 
ing the  handsome  king  of  Navarre  became  king  of  France. 
He  was  called  Henry  iv.,  and  he  was  one  of  the  best  kings 
France  had  ever  had.  He  became  a  Catholic,  because  he 
saw  that  if  he  did  not  the  Catholics  of  France  would  never 
have  him  as  king.  But  he  was  never  very  serious  about 
religion,  and  the  story  is  told  that  when  some  one  spoke  to 
him  about  changing  so  easily,  he  laughed  and  said  that  Paris 
was  '  well  worth  a  mass.' 

But  Henry  would  not  have  any  more  persecution  of  the 
Protestants.  They  were  now  allowed  to  set  up  churches, 
and  pray  in  their  own  way  in  certain  towns.  Indeed,  it  was 
through  his  kindness  to  the  Huguenots  that  Henry  iy.  died 
after  a  very  short  reign,  and  before  he  had  time  to  make 
France  into  the  greatest  state  of  Europe,  as  he  would  have 
done  if  he  had  lived. 

Henry  was  going  to  start  in  two  days'  time  for  a  great 

Y 


338  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

war  with  Germany,  when  he  was  stabbed  to  the  heart  in  the 
streets  of  Paris  by  a  man  named  Ravaillac,  who  thought  that 
he  was  not  a  good  Cathohc.  It  will  be  interesting  to  see 
what  had  been  happening  to  the  Protestants  in  other 
countries  ruled  by  Catholic  kings. 


CHAPTER   XXXII 

THE  COUNTER-REFORMATION 

We  have  seen  how,  even  before  the  Protestant  reformers 
rebelled  against  the  Church,  Catholic  reformers  like  Erasmus 
and  Colet  and  More  had  tried  to  make  the  Church  better. 
People  had  read  their  books  and  laughed  at  the  witty  and 
clever  things  in  those  of  Erasmus  and  More ;  but  there  was 
no  reform,  and  the  Church  and  the  people  did  not  become 
more  religious  and  better  educated  as  the  reformers  had 
hoped,  though  there  were  always  some  people  who  were 
hoping  for  better  things. 

But  when  first  Luther  and  then  other  Protestant 
reformers  rose  in  rebellion  against  the  Church,  at  last  the 
Pope  and  the  Catholics  were  startled.  People  began  to 
think  more  seriously  about  religion.  Many  people  were  sad 
when  they  saw  how  the  old  teaching  and  ways  of  the  Church 
were  attacked  by  the  reformers.  This  led  to  a  new  time  in 
the  life  of  the  Church,  a  time  when  religion  spread  once  more 
among  the  people,  and  new  religious  orders  and  great  saints 
arose  once  more  in  the  Church. 

The  changes  at  this  time  are  called  the  'Counter- 
Reformation,'  which  means  the  movement  against  the 
Reformation. 

In  this  wonderful  Counter- Reformation  against  Pro- 
testantism many  countries  were  kept  from  being  Protestant, 
and  some  which  had  become  Protestant  were  even  won 
back.  It  was  the  rise  of  this  great  eagerness  and  new  love 
for  the  old  Church  which  led  to  the  great  struggle  between 
Catholics   and   Protestants   during   the   second   half  of  the 

339 


840  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

sixteenth  century  and  on  to  the  seventeenth.  In  the  end 
it  was  chiefly  the  Southern  people  who  remained  CathoHc. 

There  were  never  more  than  a  very  few  Protestants  in 
Italy  and  Spain,  and  it  was  in  these  countries  that  the 
Counter-Reformation  began.  After  many  years  of  struggle 
nearly  all  South  Germany  was  Catholic,  and  the  Northern 
parts  Protestant.  Countries  where  the  Slavs  had  settled,  like 
Hungary  and  Poland,  were  Catholic.  The  Northern  nations, 
Norway,  Sweden  and  Denmark,  were  Protestant.  We  have 
already  seen  how  England  and  Scotland  became  Protestant, 
while  Ireland,  which  had  been  conquered  by  England,  was 
always  Catholic. 

It  was  in  Catholic  countries  under  Protestant  rulers  and 
Protestant  countries  under  Catholic  rulers,  that  the  bitterest 
struggles  between  the  Reformation  and  the  Counter-Refor- 
mation took  place. 

The  great  new  religious  order  of  the  Counter-Reformation 
was  the  Society  of  Jesus.  Those  who  belonged  to  it  soon 
came  to  be  called  Jesuits.  The  man  who  started  it  was  St. 
Ignatius  Loyola.  Ignatius  was  a  Spaniard  and  the  son  of  a 
noble  house.  When  he  was  a  boy  he  was  a  page  at  the 
court  of  King  Ferdinand  of  Aragon.  He  afterwards  became 
a  soldier,  but  was  wounded  in  battle  and  made  lame  for  life. 

While  he  lay  in  bed,  ill  from  his  wound,  Ignatius  asked 
for  some  books  to  be  brought  to  him.  He  wanted  stories  of 
knights  and  ladies  such  as  he  had  read  before  and  loved.  But 
some  one  gave  him  instead  the  Lives  of  the  Saints.  He  began 
to  read  them  without  much  interest,  for  though  he  was  a  good 
Catholic  he  had  not  before  thought  very  much  about  religion. 
But  now  all  of  a  sudden  it  seemed  to  be  the  only  thing  worth 
living  for. 

Ignatius  felt  that  he  too  could  try  to  be  a  saint,  and  if 
he  could  no  longer  be  a  soldier  of  the  king  he  could  be  what 
was  much  better — a  soldier  of  Christ  and  a  knight  of  Our 
Lady.  Ignatius  had  always  been  very  brave.  When  his  leg 
was  first  hurt  the  bone  had  been  joined  badly,  and  the  doctors 


THE  COUNTER-REFORMATION  341 

had  to  break  it  and  set  it  again.  Ignatius  bore  it  without  a 
cry,  just  clenching  his  hands  tightly.  Now,  when  he  changed 
his  life  altogether,  he  made  up  his  mind  to  suffer  bravely  for 
the  sake  of  Christ.  At  first  he  thought  he  would  go  and 
fight  in  the  Holy  Land,  like  the  crusaders  of  the  Middle 
Ages,  and  he  did  make  a  pilgrimage  there. 

But  then  the  thought  came  to  him  that  he  might  do  far 
better  work  by  fighting  against  Protestantism  in  Europe. 
He  was  not  very  well-educated,  as  he  had  been  trained  to  be 
a  soldier,  and  so,  though  he  was  a  grown  man,  he  went  to 
several  universities  and  studied  beside  young  boys  quite 
simply  and  humbly. 

At  the  university  of  Paris  several  young  men  joined  him, 
among  them  another  Spaniard  who  became  the  great  St. 
Francis  Xavier. 

They  made  up  their  minds  to  form  a  society,  and  in  the 
end  they  got  the  Pope  to  allow  them  to  do  so.  Many  men 
joined  the  Society  of  Jesus,  and  Ignatius  was  head  of  all. 
He  was  called  the  general,  and  every  one  in  the  society  had 
to  obey  him,  just  as  soldiers  obey  their  generals  without  any 
question.  It  was  this  wonderful  obedience  which  made  the 
Society  of  Jesus  different  from  any  other  religious  order. 
The  general  knew  that  he  had  only  to  give  an  order,  and  any 
member  of  the  society  would  obey  whatever  it  might  be. 
And  the  only  reason  for  the  setting  up  of  the  society  was 
to  work  for  the  Pope. 

In  a  short  time  the  Jesuits  spread  into  every  country  of 
Europe,  and  the  Pope  knew  that  he  had  in  them  a  great 
army  to  help  on  the  work  of  the  Counter-Reformation. 
No  Jesuit  ever  thought  of  himself,  but  always  of  the  society. 
He  was  taught  to  do  this  from  the  first  day  he  joined  it. 

St.  Ignatius  wrote  a  wonderful  book  called  the  Spiritual 
Exercises.  The  exercises  were  thoughts  and  meditations 
about  God  and  religion,  and  every  novice,  as  the  young  men 
who  were  being  trained  to  be  Jesuits  were  called,  went  into 
retreat  for  four  weeks  when  he  joined  the  society.     That  is 


342  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

to  say,  he  did  not  speak  to  his  companions,  but  gave  up 
his  time  to  prayer,  and  went  right  through  the  Spiritual 
Exercises. 

The  Jesuits  set  up  many  schools  for  boys,  and  trained 
their  pupils  to  feel  about  the  Church  and  Pope  just  as  they 
did  themselves.  Jesuits  travelled  into  far-off  countries  like 
India  and  Japan  and  the  newly  discovered  America,  giving 
their  whole  lives  to  teaching  the  Catholic  religion. 

Some  Jesuits  were  always  to  be  found  in  England  under 
Elizabeth,  although  they  knew  that  they  would  certainly  be 
put  to  death  if  they  were  found,  as  many  of  them  were. 
After  St.  Ignatius  died  his  work  went  on,  and  the  Jesuits 
to-day  are  still  governed  by  a  general  whom  all  must  obey 
like  soldiers. 

As  there  had  been  so  much  questioning  about  the  Church's 
teaching,  a  great  council  was  called  at  the  city  of  Trent,  in 
the  North  of  Italy,  to  lay  down  once  more  the  teaching  of 
the  Church.  It  met  in  the  year  1545,  and  with  interruptions 
went  on  until  1563. 

The  emperor,  Charles  v.,  and  some  of  the  Catholics  hoped 
that  the  council  would  make  some  sort  of  agreement  with 
the  Protestants,  and  so  perhaps  get  them  back  to  the  Church 
again,  but  the  greater  number  of  the  Catholics,  and  especially 
the  Jesuits,  would  not  hear  of  this.  Charles  v.  was  dead 
before  the  great  Council  of  Trent  came  to  an  end,  but  he 
already  saw  that  there  was  no  hope  of  the  Catholics  and 
Protestants  coming  to  an  agreement.  The  council  made  the 
teaching  of  the  Church  plainer  than  ever,  and  made  it  plain, 
too,  that  no  one  who  had  any  other  opinions  could  remain  in 
the  Church. 

The  Struggle  between  Spain  and  the  Netherlands 

Among  the  strictest  CathoHcs  of  the  Counter-Reformation 
was  King  Philip  ii.  of  Spain.  He  was  the  son  of  the 
Emperor  Charles  v.,  who  in  the  year  1555,  tired  out  and  old 


THE  COUNTER-REFORMATION 


343 


before  his  time,  gave  up  all  his  empire  and  went  to  live 
quietly  in  Spain.  He  did  not  become  a  monk,  but  he  lived 
near  a  monastery  and  joined  the  monks  in  their  long  prayers. 
He  did  not  live  long.  Charles's 
brother,  Ferdinand,  became  emperor 
after  him,  but  his  son  Philip  became 
king  of  Spain  and  ruler  of  the  Low 
Countries. 

Philip  was  a  young  man  with 
fair  hair  and  a  broad  forehead  and 
blue  eyes  like  his  father,  Charles  v., 
but  he  was  not  like  his  father  in 
other  ways.  Charles  had  always 
been  wise  and  fairly  tolerant,  and 
had  treated  the  Protestants  much 
better  than  any  of  the  other  Catholic 
rulers. 

But  Philip  was  quite  different. 
He  was  absolute  ruler  of  Spain.  No 
one  but  the  king  had  any  power 
there,  and  he  was  determined  to  rule 
the  Low  Countries  in  just  the  same 
way.  He  hated  the  Protestants,  and 
as  there  were  many  Protestants  in 
the  Low  Countries,  a  terrible  struggle 
broke  out  between  them  and  Spain. 

There  were  seventeen  provinces 
altogether  in  the  Low  Countries,  or 
the  Netherlands  as  they  were  called. 
Each  had  its  own  ways  and  its  own 
government,  but  they  were  all  joined 

under  one  ruler,  and  this  ruler  was  now  the  king  of  Spain.  The 
people  of  the  different  provinces  belonged  to  different  races. 
There  were  Dutchmen  in  the  North,  many  of  whom  were 
fishermen.  The  land  was  very  low  indeed  there,  and  great 
walls  or  dykes  were  built  to  keep  the  sea  from  covering  it. 


PHILIP    II.    OF    SPAIN    AND    THE 
NETHERLANDS 

(From  a  portrait  by  the  great 
Venetian  painter  Titian). 


344  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

There  is  a  story  of  how  a  little  boy  was  once  going  to  his 
home  at  night  when  he  saw  that  there  was  a  hole  in  a  dyke 
and  the  water  was  pouring  in.  He  was  afraid  that  if  he  went 
on  to  tell  anybody  the  water  would  have  time  to  flood  the 
land,  so  he  bravely  pushed  his  arm  through  the  hole.  It  was 
just  big  enough  to  stop  it,  and  there  he  stayed  all  night  in  the 
cold  and  dark,  until  in  the  morning  some  workmen  passing 
to  their  work  found  him.  The  hole  was  mended  and  the  land 
was  saved  through  the  courage  of  the  boy. 

In  the  South  and  East  the  people  were  Flemish  and  Dutch. 
There  were  many  cities  and  much  trade.  Very  early  the 
Protestant  reformers  had  spread  their  teaching  among  the 
Netherlanders,  and  even  Charles  v.  had  put  many  of  the 
people  to  death,  for  he  could  do  there  what  he  did  not  dare 
to  do  in  Germany.  Yet  Charles  was  really  a  Fleming  and 
liked  the  people  of  the  Netherlands,  while  Philip  was  a 
thorough  Spaniard. 

As  soon  as  he  became  king,  Philip  sailed  away  to  Spain, 
and  left  his  sister  Margaret  to  rule  the  Netherlands.  But  he 
left  orders,  too,  that  the  Protestants  should  be  rooted  out  of 
the  land.  '  I  shall  not  rest,'  he  said,  *  while  there  is  one  man 
left  believing  in  the  teaching  of  Martin  Luther.' 

He  sent  men  called  Inquisitors  to  find  out  which  people 
were  Protestants  and  to  have  them  burnt  to  death.  In  Spain 
itself  the  Inquisition  had  been  set  up.  It  was  in  the  hands  of 
Dominicans,  and  it  showed  no  mercy  to  Protestants.  The 
story  of  the  terrors  of  the  Inquisition  spread  all  over  Europe, 
and  made  the  Protestant  countries  like  England  hate  Spain 
more  than  ever. 

Not  only  the  Protestants  in  the  Netherlands,  but  the 
Catholics  too  were  angry  against  Philip.  They  were  ready 
to  fight  not  only  for  their  religion  but  also  for  freedom.  Even 
Margaret,  though  she  was  a  Catholic,  sent  word  to  Philip  by 
the  CathoUc  Count  Egmont  that  he  was  making  a  mistake  in 
his  rule  of  the  Low  Countries.  But  he  took  no  notice.  Then 
two  hundred  nobles  carried  a  petition   to  Margaret  at  the 


THE  COUNTER-REFOKMATION  345 

court  of  Brussels,  and  when  it  was  read  to  her  she  said 
nothing,  but  tears  ran  down  her  face.  A  story  is  told  that 
some  one  standing  near  her  said, '  Surely  your  Highness  is  not 
afraid  of  these  Beggars.' 

The  name  '  Beggars '  stuck  to  the  Protestants,  and 
became  their  watchword.  Still  Philip  took  no  notice.  Then 
the  news  came  that  he  was  sending  the  great  duke  of  Alva 
to  govern  the  Netherlands.  Every  one  had  heard  of  him,  and 
knew  that  he  would  have  no  mercy.  '  I  have  tamed  men  of 
iron,'  he  said  ;  '  shall  I  not  easily  crush  these  men  of  butter  ? ' 
He  was  to  find  that  here  again  he  had  men  of  iron  to  deal 
with.  Alva  arrived  with  a  great  Spanish  army.  He  had  kept 
them  in  order  while  they  marched,  but  in  the  Netherlands 
they  were  allowed  to  treat  the  people  in  the  most  terrible 
way. 

The  first  thing  Alva  did  was  to  put  the  two  Catholic 
counts  Egmont  and  Horn,  who  had  stood  up  for  the  freedom 
of  their  country,  in  prison.  He  pretended  to  be  friendly  to 
them  and  asked  them  to  his  house  at  Brussels.  When  they 
were  there,  they  were  seized  and  carried  off  as  prisoners  to 
the  castle  of  Ghent.  After  being  there  a  year  they  were 
brought  before  the  '  Council  of  Blood,'  as  the  people  called 
the  judges  whom  Alva  had  set  up  to  try  the  Protestants. 
They  were  condemned  to  die,  and  even  the  Spanish  soldiers 
cried  when  they  saw  them  led  to  the  scaffold  in  the  great 
square  at  Brussels.  They  walked  bravely  to  their  death. 
Count  Egmont  dressed  in  red,  with  a  short  cloak  of  black  and 
gold  over  his  shoulder.     He  prayed  as  he  walked. 

Alva  wished  to  frighten  the  people  by  these  things,  but  he 
only  made  them  hate  him.  Margaret,  who  had  now  gone 
away  from  the  Netherlands,  had  said  that  he  would  '  make 
the  very  name  of  Spaniard  hateful  to  the  people.'  And  so 
he  did. 

Hundreds  of  people  besides  the  two  counts  were  con- 
demned to  death  by  the  Council  of  Blood,  but  the  '  Beggars  ' 
only  grew  more  determined  than  ever.     They  now  had  for 


346  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

their  leader  William  of  Orange.  Orange  was  a  little  district 
in  the  South-East  of  France,  but  William  had  lands  in  the 
Netherlands,  and  Germany  too,  and  was  much  more  German 
than  French.  William's  father  was  a  Lutheran,  but  Charles  v. 
had  had  the  boy  brought  up  as  a  Catholic  at  his  court.  He 
was  fond  of  him,  and  when  he  resigned  his  crown  to  Philip, 
in  the  great  court  of  his  palace  at  Brussels,  the  Emperor  leaned 
on  the  shoulder  of  William,  who  was  then  a  young  man  of 
twenty-two. 

William  fought  for  Charles  in  his  wars  with  France,  and 
he  was  one  of  the  men  who  made  the  Treaty  with  France 
which  ended  the  wars.  He  was  very  careful  not  to  say 
anything  too  much  at  this  time,  for  fear  the  French  would 
take  advantage  of  some  slip  of  the  tongue,  and  ever  afterwards 
he  was  called  '  William  the  Silent,'  but  he  was  not  at  all  a 
quiet  man.  He  was  always  very  eager  for  what  he  thought 
was  right,  and  was  a  great  speaker.  He  used  fine  language, 
and  could  easily  persuade  the  people  who  heard  him  to  do 
what  he  wanted. 

When  Philip  became  king,  William  the  Silent  was  made 
ruler  over  Holland  and  some  other  of  the  provinces  of  the 
North.  But  he  never  liked  Philip,  and  he  joined  the  counts 
of  Egmont  and  Horn  against  him.  Soon  afterw^ards  William 
became  a  Protestant,  first  a  Lutheran  and  then  a  Calvinist, 
and  from  this  time  he  led  the  Protestants  in  their  struggle 
with  Philip.  William  had  left  the  Netherlands  and  gone  to 
his  lands  in  Germany  before  Alva  came,  but  his  eldest  son, 
Philip  William,  a  boy  studying  at  the  university  of  Louvain, 
was  seized  by  the  Spaniards  and  carried  off  to  Spain.  There 
he  was  brought  up  by  Philip  as  an  enemy  to  his  father. 

Many  of  the  '  Beggars '  had  begun  almost  to  live  on  the 
sea.  The  Netherlanders  were  always  very  much  at  home 
on  the  sea,  and  they  now  began  to  revenge  themselves  by 
attacking  the  Spanish  ships,  and  taking  their  treasures. 

Suddenly,  on  the  1st  of  April  in  the  year  1572,  some  of 
the  '  Beggars' '  ships  sailed  into  the  mouth  of  the  river  Meuse, 


THE  COUNTER-REFORMATION  347 

and  attacked  the  town  of  Brill.  A  ferryman  saw  them  coming, 
and  told  the  Spaniards  and  the  people  in  the  town,  which  was 
under  the  rule  of  Alva.  The  ferryman  stated  that  perhaps 
there  were  five  thousand,  although  he  knew  that  there  were 
not  more  than  three  hundred.  Then  all  the  people  fled  away 
from  Brill,  and  the  '  Beggars '  took  it  for  their  own.  It  was 
the  beginning  of  a  great  change. 

All  over  the  Northern  provinces  the  people  rose  against 
the  Spaniards,  and  took  William  the  Silent  to  rule  over  them. 
The  duke  of  Alva  was  terribly  angry,  but  the  Netherlanders 
were  full  of  joy,  and  the  people  sang  in  the  streets 

'  On  April  Fools'  Day 
Duke  Alva's  spectacles  were  stolen  away.' 

The  name  Brill  means  '  spectacles  '  in  Dutch,  and  the  rhyme 
was  a  pun  on  the  name  of  the  town. 

The  Protestants  had  to  fight  many  a  hard  battle  still 
against  the  Spaniards.  In  the  first  winter  the  Spaniards 
were  surprised  to  see  the  Dutchmen  skating  over  the  frozen 
waters  to  fight  them,  but  the  Spaniards  ordered  skates  too, 
and  soon  learned  to  use  them.  The  beautiful  city  of  Haarlem 
was  besieged  for  seven  months,  but  had  to  give  way  at  last. 
Still  thousands  of  Spaniards  had  lost  their  lives  in  taking  it. 
Then  began  the  siege  of  the  town  of  Leyden,  which  lasted  for 
a  year.  The  people  in  it  were  dying  of  starvation,  but  still 
they  would  not  give  way. 

Then  William  the  Silent,  '  Father  Wilham,'  as  the  Dutch 
lovingly  called  him,  thought  of  a  way  to  save  it.  He  had 
holes  made  in  the  dykes,  and  the  water  flowed  in  on  the  land. 
The  people  went  into  their  ships.  '  Better  a  drowned  land 
than  a  lost  land,'  said  William.  The  Spaniards  laughed,  for 
they  thought  the  water  would  never  rise  as  high  as  Leyden, 
but  it  did.  The  Spaniards  fled  away,  and  the  '  Beggars  '  sailed 
up  in  their  ships  to  save  the  people  of  Leyden,  and  to  give 
them  food  and  comfort. 

For  many  years  yet  the  struggle  between  Spain  and  the 


348 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


Netherlands  went  on.  The  duke  of  Alva  went  back  to 
Spain,  but  Philip  sent  his  own  half-brother,  the  brave  Don 
John  of  Austria,  to  take  his  place.  One  thing  which 
prevented  the  Netherlanders  from  conquering  the  Spaniards 
was  that  the   Provinces   would   not  really  join   themselves 


THE    SPANIARDS    CAPTURE    ANTWERP    IN    THEIR    LONG    STRUGGLE 
WITH    THE    DUTCH 

This  was  one  of  man_y  tragedies  in  the  long  fight  of  the  Dutch  people  for  freedom  from 
Spanish  t3Tannj.  The  Spaniards  were  the  finest  soldiers  in  Europe  in  the  sixteenth 
eentur}-,  and  the  stubborn  resistance  of  the  '  clumsy  '  Dutch  so  infuriated  them  that  when 
they  captured  Antwerp  they  took  so  mad  and  merciless  a  revenge  that  it  has  always 
been  known  as  the  'Spanish  Fury.'     (From  a  sixteenth-century  engraving). 


together,  as  William  advised  them.  He  himself  had  no 
wish  to  be  ruler,  and  was  quite  ready  to  set  up  a  republic. 
But  the  Southern  Provinces,  which  were  Catholic,  did  not 
like  this.  There  were  many  nobles  there,  and  they  did  not 
like  the  idea  of  a  republic. 

In  the  end  William  lived  the  last  part  of  his  life  very 
quietly  in  the  North.     He  had  spent  nearly  all  his  money  for 


THE  COUNTER-REFORMATION  349 

his  country,  and  at  last  he  was  to  give  his  life  too.  Philip 
had  declared  William  an  outlaw  and  a  traitor,  and  offered  a 
reward  of  a  great  deal  of  money  to  any  one  who  should  rid 
the  world  of  such  a  pest. 

A  Spaniard  shot  at  William  in  the  streets  of  Antwerp, 
but  though  the  ball  went  in  by  his  right  ear  and  out  through 
his  left  cheek  he  was  not  killed,  but  his  wife  died  from 
the  shock.  Though  William  knew  that  he  was  always  in 
danger,  he  could  not  bear  to  have  himself  guarded  all  the 
time,  and  at  last  he  was  shot  down  by  a  Frenchman  in  his 
own  house  at  Delft.  The  people,  and  even  the  children, 
wept  at  the  news,  but  WilUam  had  after  all  won  freedom  for 
his  country. 

It  was  not  long  before  the  Spaniards  had  to  give  the 
Netherlands  their  freedom,  for  Philip  had  great  battles  to 
fight  in  other  places.  Great  English  soldiers  crossed  the  sea 
to  fight  for  the  Netherlands  against  Spain,  and  so  at  last  in 
1609  the  seven  Northern  Provinces  became  independent  of 
Spain.  The  ten  Provinces  of  the  South  remained  under  the 
government  of  the  daughter  of  the  Spanish  king  and  her 
husband,  but  they,  too,  had  won  the  liberties  for  which  they 
had  fought.  The  Northern  Provinces  are  now  the  little  Pro- 
testant kingdom  of  Holland,  and  the  Southern  Provinces 
the  little  Catholic  kingdom  of  Belgium. 

So  ended  one  of  the  bitterest  struggles  between  the 
Reformation  and  the  Counter-Reformation. 


CHAPTER   XXXIII 


ENGLAND  AND  SPAIN 


In  the  year  1558,  Mary  Tudor,  the  sad  daughter  of  Queen 
Catharine  of  Aragon,  had  died,  and  her  half-sister,  Elizabeth, 
the  daughter  of  Henry  viii.  and  Anne  Boleyn,  had  become 

queen  of  England.  She  was 
only  twenty-five  years  old 
then,  and  she  ruled  England 
until  she  was  seventy.  Mary 
Tudor  had  said  that  when  she 
died  two  names  would  be 
found  written  on  her  heart, 
those  of  '  Philip  '  and  *  Calais  ' 
—  Philip,  the  Spanish  hus- 
band whom  she  loved,  and 
who  had  left  her  lonely,  and 
Calais,  the  only  place  which 
England  had  kept  in  France, 
and  which  had  been  taken 
again  by  the  French  when 
Philip  got  the  English  to 
help  him  in  his  wars  against 
France. 

Now   Philip   would  have 
liked  to  marry  Queen  Eliza- 
beth, and  so  keep  the  help 
of     England,     but     though 
Elizabeth  never  meant  to  marry  him,  she  did  not  say  *  No ' 
at  once.     She  never  really  meant  to  marry  anybody.     She 


ELIZABETH,    ONE    OF    THE    GREATEST    OF 
ENGLISH    SOVEREIGNS 

(From  a  painting  now  in  the  National  Portrait 
Gallery). 


ENGLAND  AND  SPAIN  351 

was  very  vain,  and  loved  to  think  that  men  admired  her, 
although  they  never  did  fall  in  love  with  her,  as  people 
did  with  Mary  Queen  of  Scots,  of  whom  Elizabeth  was  so 
jealous. 

But  all  through  her  reign  Elizabeth  pretended  that  she 
was  going  to  marry  first  one  foreign  prince  and  then  another. 
She  did  this  to  keep  other  countries  friendly  to  England 
when  she  needed  them,  for  with  all  her  faults  Elizabeth  loved 
England,  and  was  wonderfully  clever  in  keeping  her  country 
safe  and  strong  at  a  very  difficult  time. 

When  Elizabeth  came  to  the  throne,  England  was  not  one 
of  the  greatest  countries  in  Europe,  but  it  was  the  greatest  of 
all  when  she  died.  There  were  sad  sides  to  her  reign,  such  as 
the  persecution  of  the  Catholics  and  the  Puritans,  but  in 
other  ways  it  was  a  '  golden '  age.  England  became  the 
greatest  power  on  the  seas,  and  the  people  were  full  of  joy 
and  interest  in  life.  There  was  a  kind  of  late  Renaissance  in 
England  when  the  Italian  Renaissance  was  really  ending. 
Great  poets  arose  in  England  at  this  time.  There  was 
Edmund  Spenser,  who  wrote  the  great  poem  called  the 
Faerie  Queene  in  honour  of  Elizabeth,  and  there  was  Sir 
Philip  Sidney,  who  wrote  beautiful  sonnets. 

Sidney  was  a  brave  soldier  as  well  as  a  poet,  and  one  of 
the  noblest  men  of  his  time.  He  was  killed  while  he  was 
fighting  for  the  Protestants  of  the  Low  Countries  against 
Spain.  A  story  is  told  of  how  when  Sidney  lay  wounded  on 
the  battlefield  he  was  very  thirsty,  and  water  was  brought  to 
him  to  drink.  But  he  saw  a  poor  soldier,  who  was  lying  near 
also  wounded,  look  longingly  at  the  water,  and  he  told  the 
person  who  was  offering  him  the  water  to  give  it  to  the  poor 
soldier  instead,  saying :  '  He  needs  it  more  than  I  do. ' 
There  was,  too,  the  greatest  poet  England,  and  perhaps  the 
world,  has  ever  known,  William  Shakespeare.  Before  the 
end  of  the  reign  he  was  writing  his  wonderful  plays,  and  they 
were  being  acted  in  London. 

It  was  a  time,  too,  of  great  English  sailors  and  soldiers 


352  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

and  adventurers.  It  was  no  longer  Italians  like  Columbus 
who  were  the  leaders  of  discovery,  but  Englishmen  like  Sir 
Francis  Drake  and  Sir  Walter  Raleigh. 

It  was  partly  this  new  love  of  adventure  and  the 
determination  to  be  the  greatest  of  all  on  the  seas,  that 
led  to  the  terrible  hatred  between  the  English  and  the 
Spaniards  in  Elizabeth's  reign.  It  was  partly,  too,  the 
question  of  religion.  By  this  time  Englishmen  loved  their 
new  religion  and  hated  Catholicism,  and  they  hated  Spain 
because  she  was  the  most  Catholic  power  of  all. 

All  through  Elizabeth's  reign  the  English  people  were 
longing  for  war  with  Spain,  but  it  was  many  years  before 
Elizabeth  would  allow  it.  She  waited  until  she  felt  that 
England  was  strong  enough  to  conquer. 

Yet  long  before  the  war  began  English  sailors  were 
attacking  the  great  Spanish  ships,  or  galleons  as  they  w^ere 
called,  which  were  always  sailing  home  to  Spain  laden  with 
gold  and  silver  and  other  treasure  from  the  rich  mines  of  the 
great  continent  of  South  America.  For  nearly  the  whole  of 
South  America  belonged  to  Spain. 

This  is  how  it  had  happened.  After  Columbus  had  found 
lands  across  the  Atlantic  other  discoverers  followed  him.  In 
the  year  1497,  an  Italian,  John  Cabot,  with  his  son  Sebastian, 
sailed  out  of  Bristol  harbour  in  a  ship  given  to  him  by  King 
Henry  vii.  of  England.  He  discovered  the  land  which  is  now 
called  Newfoundland,  and  in  other  voyages  he  came  upon 
Labrador.  But  always  he  thought,  like  Columbus,  that  it 
was  some  part  of  China. 

It  was  another  Italian,  called  Amerigo  Vespucci,  who 
first  declared  that  he  believed  the  new  land  to  be  another 
continent  altogether,  and  that  another  great  ocean  separated 
it  from  China.  He  had  sailed  to  the  Northern  coast  of 
what  was  afterwards  called  South  America.  And  so  although 
it  was  through  the  genius  of  Columbus  that  the  great  new 
continent  was  discovered,  it  was  called  America  after  Amerigo 
Vespucci,  who  first  guessed  that  it  was  not  China. 


QUEEN    ELIZABETH    WITH    THE    LORDS    AND    COMMONS    IN    PARLIAMENT. 
(From  an  engraving  published  in  1600.) 


ENGLAND  AND  SPAIN  353 

But  though  it  was  Italians  who  made  the  first  discoveries 
in  America,  it  was  Spain  which  had  helped  them,  and  soon 
Spaniards  began  to  be  most  eager  in  the  search,  especially 
when  it  was  found  that  the  gold  and  silver  and  treasure 
which  Columbus  had  searched  for  and  never  found  in  the 
North  were  really  to  be  had  in  the  South. 

It  was  a  Spaniard  named  Bilbao  who  was  the  first 
European  to  look  upon  the  great  ocean  at  the  other  side  of 
America.  Bilbao  was  one  of  the  many  Spaniards  who  left 
Spain  and  went  to  live  at  Hayti,  the  colony  set  up  by 
Columbus.  But  Bilbao  was  not  a  good  farmer,  and  he  was 
soon  in  debt.  It  was  a  rule  that  no  one  could  leave  Hayti 
without  paying  his  debts,  but  one  day  Bilbao  hid  himself  in  a 
barrel  on  a  ship  which  was  to  sail  away  from  Hayti.  He 
crawled  out  when  the  ship  was  well  out  to  sea,  and  so  he  got 
away.  But  the  ship  was  wrecked  on  the  coast  of  the  Isthmus 
of  Darien,  now  called  Panama,  the  narrow  piece  of  land 
joining  North  and  South  America.  Bilbao  found  that  there 
were  many  rich  villages  of  natives  near. 

The  discoverers  called  all  the  different  peoples  in  America 
Indians,  but  they  were  not  at  all  like  the  people  of  India,  and 
they  were  very  different,  too,  from  one  another.  In  the  North 
the  chief  race  were  a  red-skinned  people,  who  were  called 
the  Red  Indians.  They  were  not  exactly  savages,  though 
they  lived  very  simply.  In  the  South  the  people  were  darker, 
but  were  quite  different  from  the  negroes  whom  Prince 
Henry's  explorers  had  found  in  Africa. 

In  some  parts  of  South  America  these  Indians  were 
civilized,  and  had  built  great  cities,  but  it  was  not  a  very 
high  civilization.  In  some  ways  they  lived  rather  in  the 
same  way  as  the  Persians  in  the  days  of  Xerxes  or  Darius. 
They  made  a  great  show  of  gold  and  precious  stones,  but 
they  had  never  found  out  how  to  use  iron,  and  were  not, 
of  course,  nearly  so  civilized  as  the  peoples  of  Europe.  But 
it  was  not  these  more  civilized  peoples  whom  Bilbao  saw, 
though  he  was  told  about  them.    Bilbao  made  up  his  mind  to 

z 


854  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

climb  the  high  mountains  which  divided  the  isthmus.  And 
so  he  did.  From  the  top  he  saw  the  great  ocean  to  the 
West.  He  and  his  companions  sang  the  Te  Deum,  the 
great  hymn  of  joy,  and  set  up  a  cross,  taking  possession  of 
the  sea  for  the  king  of  Spain. 

It  was  a  Portuguese,  Magellan,  who  shortly  afterwards 
sailed  in  Spanish  ships  right  round  the  South  of  South 
America,  and  into  the  great  sea  beyond  which  he  called  the 
Pacific  Ocean.  Then,  too,  he  sailed  right  across  that  ocean 
for  over  ninety  days  until,  nearly  dead  with  starvation,  he 
and  his  men  reached  the  Islands  of  the  Philippines,  as  they 
were  called  later,  after  Philip  ii. 

Everywhere  these  discoverers  went  they  tried  to  make  the 
natives  Christians,  and  got  them  to  pay  tribute  to  the  great 
king  of  Spain.  But  one  native  prince  in  the  Philippines 
refused  to  do  this,  and  Magellan  was  killed  in  a  fight  with 
him.  Many  of  his  men  were  killed  too  and  others  had  died 
of  starvation,  and  so  it  was  only  a  few  in  the  Victoria,  one  of 
the  five  ships  which  had  set  out  on  the  voyage,  who  came 
again  to  Spain.  They  had  suffered  terribly,  but  they  had 
done  one  of  the  most  wonderful  things  men  have  ever  done 
upon  the  seas.  They  were  the  first  to  sail  right  round  the 
world.  The  straits  to  the  South  of  South  America  were 
called  after  Magellan,  the  greatest  explorer  after  Columbus 
that  the  world  has  ever  had. 


Spain's  Conquests  in  America 

It  was  not  long  before  the  Spanish  took  for  themselves 
two  of  the  richest  and  most  civilized  parts  of  the  new 
continent,  Mexico,  the  land  just  to  the  North  of  the  Isthmus 
of  Panama,  and  Peru  to  the  South  of  it.  Mexico  was 
conquered  by  a  Spanish  gentleman  called  Fernando  Cortes. 
He  landed  on  the  spot  which  was  afterwards  called  Vera 
Cruz,  or  the  True  Cross,  and  was  surprised  to  see  natives  in 
fine  cotton  clothes  and  ornaments  of  gold  coming  down  to 


ENGLAND  AND  SPAIN  355 

meet  them.  These  men  could  draw  and  sketch,  for  they 
immediately  began  making  drawings  of  the  Spaniards  and 
their  ships,  which  they  called  '  water  houses.'  These  drawings 
they  carried  away  to  their  king,  Montezuma. 

He  was  a  very  splendid  king  and  lived  in  a  very  magnificent 
way  in  his  chief  town  of  Mexico.  He  never  walked  when 
the  people  could  see  him,  but  was  carried  by  noblemen.  In 
his  palace  when  he  walked,  rich  tapestries  were  laid  down 
before  him.  He  never  used  the  same  cup  or  dish  twice.  He 
agreed  to  see  the  Spaniards,  but  would  not  listen  to  their 
story  of  Christ  or  become  a  Christian.  Cortes  really  took 
him  prisoner,  and  the  Spaniards,  thinking  the  Mexicans  were 
going  to  attack  them,  attacked  them  first,  and  a  fight  broke 
out.  Cortes  made  Montezuma  appear  at  one  of  the  high 
windows  of  his  palace  and  tell  his  people  to  stop  fighting. 
But  the  people  were  angry  and  threw  stones  at  him.  He 
was  hurt  and  broken-hearted,  and  died  a  few  days  after. 

Cortes  had  to  go  away,  but  he  brought  back  from  Spain 
more  ships  and  men,  and  laid  siege  to  Mexico.  It  was  a 
terrible  siege,  but  the  young  king,  Montezuma's  nephew, 
would  not  give  in.  At  last  the  city  was  taken,  and  the 
young  king  thought  that  he  would  be  killed,  but  Cortes 
treated  him  with  great  respect,  telling  him  that  the  Spaniards 
knew  how  to  respect  courage  even  in  an  enemy.  But  Mexico 
now  belonged  to  Spain,  and  another  beautiful  city  was  built 
on  the  ruins  of  the  old. 

It  was  Pizarro,  a  very  different  man  from  Cortes,  who 
conquered  Peru.  Peru  was  the  most  civilized  part  of  all 
America,  and  the  richest.  Its  kings  were  called  the  Incas. 
They  had  a  great  army,  but  did  not  know  anything  about 
guns  or  swords,  Pizarro  with  a  few  men  easily  conquered 
them.  He  had  to  march  miles  and  miles  to  reach  the  capital 
of  Peru,  and  to  cross  a  great  range  of  mountains.  He  was 
very  brave,  but  very  cruel. 

The  Inca  refused  to  become  Christian,  and  was  taken 
prisoner.     He  made  a  mark  on  the  wall  of  the  room  in  which 


35  6  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

he  was  shut,  and  told  Pizarro  he  would  give  him  the  room 
full  of  gold  to  that  height.  Pizarro  took  the  gold,  but  soon 
afterwards  had  the  king  killed,  and  now  Peru,  too,  belonged 
to  Spain.  In  the  city  of  Cuzco,  the  capital  of  Peru,  wonder- 
ful treasures  were  found.  There  were  figures  made  of  gold 
and  floors  made  of  silver.  The  Spaniards  sent  great  ship 
loads  home  to  Spain,  and  it  was  these  ships  which  were  so 
often  attacked  and  taken  by  the  English  sailors. 

At  last  the  Spaniards  found  that  it  was  safer  to  send 
several  ships  home  together,  and  so  they  used  to  gather  to- 
gether in  the  mouth  of  the  La  Plata  river  in  the  South-East 
of  South  America,  and  sail  off  together  at  regular  times. 
A  number  of  ships  sailing  like  this  came  to  be  called  the 
'  Plate  Fleet.' 

The  English  and  French  ships  soon  began  to  sail  to 
South  America  to  take  their  part  in  its  trade,  but  the 
Spaniards  forbade  this.  English  sailors  who  were  caught 
were  carried  off  to  Spain,  and  dreadful  stories  were  told  of 
how  they  were  tortured  by  the  Inquisition.  All  this  made 
the  sailors  of  the  two  nations  very  bitter,  and  this  is  how 
there  came  to  be  endless  struggles  on  the  seas  long  before 
Elizabeth  and  Philip  began  the  war  between  the  two  nations. 

One  of  the  greatest  sailors  of  Queen  Elizabeth's  time 
was  Francis  Drake.  He  was  a  Devonshire  man,  like  many 
of  the  best  sailors  of  the  time.  He  was  one  of  those  who 
had  most  often  attacked  the  Spaniards  on  the  sea  and  carried 
off  their  treasure.  His  relation,  John  Hawkins,  was  another 
of  these  Devonshire  men.  It  was  he  who  started  the  cruel 
slave  trade,  carrying  off  negroes  from  Africa  in  ship  loads  to 
America,  where  the  Spaniards  were  glad  to  buy  them. 

For  the  native  Indians  were  not  fit  for  hard  work,  and 
were  fast  dying  off,  as  certain  natives  always  seem  to  do 
when  more  civilized  people  take  their  lands.  This  dreadful 
slave  trade  went  on  for  many  years.  When  Englishmen  had 
settled  in  North  America,  they  too  bought  slaves  to  work 
for  them.      The   negroes  are   a   strong   race,  and  there  are 


ENGLAND  AND  SPAIN 


357 


thousands  and  thousands  of  them  in  America  to-day.     They 
are  free  now,  but  this  is  how  they  came  to  America. 

Francis  Drake  sailed  round  the  world  after  attacking  the 
Spanish  treasure  ships  on  the  coast  of  South  America.  It 
took  him  three  years  to  do  it,  and  he  had  to  put  down 
rebellion  among  his  men,  as  so  many  of  these  early  leaders 
had  to  do.  It  was  his  friend,  Thomas  Doughty,  who  led  the 
rebellion,  and  Drake  had  his 
head  cut  off,  although  he  loved 
him.  For  he  knew  that  only 
so  could  he  keep  himself  and 
his  ship  safe.  When,  after  three 
years,  Drake  landed  in  England, 
Elizabeth  went  herself  to  Ply- 
mouth, and  knighted  him  on  the 
deck  of  his  ship,  the  Golden 
Hind,  which  she  ordered  to  be 
kept  in  memory  of  the  voyage, 
and  people  felt  that  now,  at  last, 
England  was  as  great  as  Spain 
on  the  seas.  She  was  soon  to 
be  much  greater. 

King  Philip  took  it  as  a 
great  insult  that  Elizabeth  should  honour  the  man  who 
had  taken  Spanish  treasure.  He  was  more  angry  still  at 
the  execution  of  Mary  Queen  of  Scots  in  1587.  He  said, 
too,  that  now  he  was  the  real  king  of  England  because  the 
Catholics  did  not  really  think  that  Elizabeth  had  a  right  to 
the  throne,  because  Queen  Catherine  was  still  alive  when 
Anne  Boleyn  married  Henry  viii. 

Philip  had  already  been  getting  together  a  great  fleet  to 
fight  England,  and  in  April  1587,  two  months  after  Mary 
Stewart's  death,  Drake  sailed  into  the  harbour  at  Cadiz,  and 
set  fire  to  thirty  ships  of  the  fleet  which  was  lying  ready 
there.  He  boasted  afterwards  that  he  had  *  singed  the  king 
of  Spain's  beard  this  time,'  and  he  wanted  to  do  the  same 


(From  an  old  engraving). 


358  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

over  and  over  again,  so  that  the  Spanish  fleet  would  never 
be  able  to  attack  England.  But  Elizabeth  was  afraid  that 
while  the  English  fleet  was  away  the  Spaniards  might 
suddenly  attack  England  in  another  direction,  and  land  a 
great  army. 

The  Spanish  armies  were  very  fine,  and  they  had  had 
many  years  of  training  in  the  wars  in  the  Netherlands.  The 
help  given  by  Englishmen  to  the  Netherlands  was  another 
thing  which  had  made  Philip  angry.  So,  in  the  spring  of 
1588,  Philip  had  a  great  fleet  ready  to  attack  England. 
Some  of  the  Spaniards  boasted  that  it  was  so  strong  that  it 
could  never  be  conquered,  and  called  it  the  '  Invincible 
Armada.'  But  one  great  mistake  that  the  Spaniards  made 
was  to  build  great  ships,  chiefly  to  carry  large  numbers  of 
soldiers.  They  did  not  understand  that  the  ships  themselves 
should  be  easy  to  move  and  difficult  to  attack.  Their  ships 
rose  high  out  of  the  water,  and  their  great  sides  could  be  easily 
pierced  with  bullets  from  ships  lying  lower,  as  the  English 
ships  did. 

The  Defeat  of  the  Armada 

The  English  ships  had  more  sailors  and  better  ones  than 
the  Spanish,  which  were  crammed  with  soldiers,  for  they 
meant  really  to  land  their  men  and  fight  on  land.  Still  the 
Spanish  Armada  was  a  fine  sight  as  it  sailed  into  the  English 
Channel.  The  admiral  of  the  English  fleet  was  playing  the 
old  English  game  of  bowls  with  his  captains,  when  the  news 
came  that  the  Spaniards  were  sailing  into  the  Channel. 
Drake  was  anxious  that  every  one  should  keep  cool,  and  a 
story  tells  that  he  said  carelessly,  '  There  is  plenty  of  time 
to  finish  the  game  and  beat  the  Spaniards  too.' 

For  a  week  the  two  fleets  fought  in  the  Channel,  the 
English  driving  the  Spaniards  before  them  towards  Calais. 
The  English  were  careful  never  to  get  too  near  the  Spanish 
ships,  but  would  sail  just  near  enough  to  pierce  them  with 
their  shots,  and  then  sail  quickly  away  again.     The  Spanish 


ENGLAND  AND  SPAIN 


359 


shots  passed  over  the  top  of  the  English  ships,  and  the  great 
army  of  Spanish  soldiers  were  useless.  At  the  end  of  the 
week  the  Spaniards  had  lost  three  of  their  biggest  ships  and 
thousands  of  their  men.  Powder  and  shot  ran  short  on  both 
sides,  but  the  English  could  get  more  from  the  shore,  while 
the  Spaniards  could  not. 

At  last  the  Spaniards  anchored  off  the  coast  of  France, 
but  the  English  sent  fire-ships  in  among  them,  and  destroyed 


AN    ENGLISH    SHIP    IN    THE    ARMADA    FIGHT 
(From  a  tapestrj'  woven  in  commemoration  of  the  great  victory). 


many  more  ships.  The  others  put  out  to  sea  again.  More 
ships  had  come  to  the  help  of  the  English,  and  now,  at  last, 
the  two  fleets  fought  a  great  battle.  Again  the  English  won. 
The  wind  was  with  them,  and  they  were  able,  when  they 
liked,  to  sail  against  it,  because  they  knew  how  to  manage 
their  ships,  which  the  Spaniards  did  not. 

At  last  the  Spaniards  made  up  their  minds  to  sail  round 
Scotland,  and  so  back  to  Spain,  but  a  great  storm  broke  out, 
and  many  of  the  ships  were  wrecked  on  the  coasts  of  Ireland. 
Not  half  of  the  ships  of  the  great  Armada  got  back  to  Spain 


360  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

again.  It  was  partly  bad  management  and  partly  bad  luck 
which  caused  this  great  misfortune  to  Spain. 

Philip  tried  to  comfort  the  commander  of  his  fleet  by 
telling  him  that  he  had  sent  him  to  fight  against  men,  and 
not  against  the  wind.  Elizabeth  had  medals  made  in  memory 
of  the  victory,  and  on  them  were  the  words  '  God  blew  with 
His  wind,  and  they  were  scattered.' 

The  defeat  of  the  Invincible  Armada  was  indeed  the  end 
of  Spain's  greatness.  Her  fleets  still  carried  home  great  loads 
of  gold,  but  the  English  often  captured  them,  and  it  was  not 
long  before  the  command  of  the  seas  was  divided  between 
the  two  great  enemies  against  whom  Spain  had  fought  so 
bitterly,  the  Dutch  and  the  EngUsh. 

Later,  these  two  were  to  fight  each  other  for  the  mastery 
also.  The  English  sailors  would  have  liked  Elizabeth  to  go 
on  fighting  Spain,  until  the  power  of  that  country  was  quite 
destroyed.  But  Elizabeth  was  wiser  than  this.  She  knew 
that  it  would  be  a  mistake  to  make  Spain  too  weak,  because 
Spain  could  help  her  in  preventing  France  becoming  too 
strong.  Elizabeth  kept  in  mind  what  came  to  be  called  the 
*  Balance  of  Power,'  which  means  that  no  country  may  be 
allowed  to  become  too  strong  and  so  conquer  the  other 
countries  of  Europe.  Twice  since  Elizabeth's  time  it  has 
seemed  that  France  might  conquer  all  Europe,  and  the 
'  Balance  of  Power '  be  upset.  Elizabeth  was  wise  to  see 
the  danger,  and  this  was  why  she  would  not  fight  too  hard 
against  Spain  in  the  last  years  of  her  reign. 

We  cannot  help  being  glad  that  Englishmen  won  in  the 
struggle  with  Spain,  but  still  we  must  remember  that  the 
Spaniards  had  proved  themselves  to  be  a  wonderful  people. 
They  had  led  the  way  in  the  marvellous  discoveries  of  the 
new  times,  and  proved  themselves  over  and  over  again 
thoroughly  brave  men.  If  their  great  time  was  soon  over, 
and  they  sank  to  a  low  place  among  the  nations  of  Europe, 
still  it  had  been  a  very  brilliant  time  indeed. 

Just  as  in  other  countries  great  writers  have  appeared 


ENGLAND  AND  SPAIN  361 

when  the  nation  has  been  doing  great  things,  so  Spain's 
greatest  writer,  Cervantes,  lived  and  wrote  in  the  second 
half  of  the  sixteenth  century.  His  great  book  was  the 
romantic  novel  called  Don  Quixote.  It  is  one  of  the  world's 
great  books.  Children  enjoy  it  because  it  is  full  of  fun  and 
adventure,  and  grown-up  people  because  it  pictures  for  us 
the  many  different  kinds  of  people  who  lived  in  Spain  in 
the  sixteenth  century,  just  as  Chaucer's  writings  show  us  the 
people  who  lived  in  England  in  the  fourteenth  century. 
The  work  of  Cervantes,  and  the  colonies  she  still  has  in 
South  America,  remain  to  remind  us  of  the  heroic  days  of 
Spain. 


CHAPTER   XXXIV 

THE  SEVENTEENTH  CENTURY 

The  seventeenth  century  was  different  in  many  ways  from  the 
sixteenth.  Things  were  settUng  down.  Religious  questions 
were  still  very  important,  but  other  things  became  still  more 
so.  Yet  one  more  great  war  of  religion  was  fought  in  the 
first  half  of  the  seventeenth  century.  It  was  the  great 
struggle  between  the  Reformation  and  the  Counter-Refor- 
mation in  Germany.  It  began  in  1618  and  ended  in  1648, 
and  is  always  called  the  Thirty  Years'  War. 

The  emperor  at  the  time  was  Ferdinand  of  Styria,  who 
had  been  a  pupil  of  the  Jesuits,  and  was  as  eager  a  Catholic 
as  Philip  of  Spain  had  been.  He  was  anxious  to  make  as 
many  of  the  German  states  as  possible  Catholic  again.  The 
little  Protestant  kingdom  of  Bohemia  generally  elected  as  its 
king  the  prince  who  was  going  to  be  the  emperor,  and  it  elected 
Ferdinand  in  this  way.  But  when  the  Bohemians  saw  that 
Ferdinand  was  going  to  be  hard  on  the  Protestants,  they  said 
they  would  not  have  him  for  their  king,  and  chose  instead 
Frederick,  the  Elector  Palatine,  the  ruler  of  one  of  the 
German  states  called  the  Palatinate.  Frederick  had  married 
the  daughter  of  James  i.  of  England,  who  had  become  king 
of  England  when  Elizabeth  died  in  1603. 

James  was  the  son  of  Mary  Queen  of  Scots,  but  had  been 
brought  up  as  a  Protestant.  Frederick  naturally  thought 
that  James  would  help  him,  but  James  always  took  a  long 
time  to  make  up  his  mind  about  anything.  He  was  a  clever 
man  in  some  ways  and  proud  of  his  learning,  but  he  never 
really  understood   other  men.     He  was   always   so  long   in 


THE  SEVENTEENTH  CENTURY  363 

making  up  his  mind  how  to  act  towards  other  countries  that 
people  despised  and  laughed  at  him.  Some  one  said  that  he 
was  the  'wisest  fool  in  Christendom.'  He  was  the  only  one 
of  the  Stewarts  who  was  not  good-looking.  His  curious  loose 
limbs  and  weak  face  gave  a  good  idea  of  his  character. 

Frederick  was  driven  from  Bohemia,  and  even  from  his 
own  Palatinate,  before  James  had  made  up  his  mind  to  help 
him,  and  when  he  did  send  help  it  was  of  little  use.  James 
was  full  of  an  idea  that  countries  should  not  fight  with  each 
other  about  religion,  and  he  was  anxious  to  show  how  tolerant 
he  was  by  marrying  his  son  to  a  Spanish  princess.  Then  he 
thought  that  Spain  would  help  him  against  the  Catholic 
emperor,  but  all  this  was  nonsense.  The  Spanish  king 
would  never  marry  his  daughter  to  a  Protestant  prince, 
though  he  did  not  say  so  immediately  to  James. 

Meanwhile,  the  struggle  between  Ferdinand  and  Frederick 
had  become  a  fight  between  the  Emperor  and  the  Protestant 
princes  of  the  empire.  It  was  the  last  great  war  of  religion, 
and  one  of  the  most  terrible  that  have  ever  been.  For  thirty 
years  the  Germans  suffered  in  the  most  terrible  way,  and  at 
the  end  of  the  war  half  of  all  the  people  had  been  killed. 

A  great  soldier  called  Wallenstein  was  the  chief  general 
on  the  Emperor's  side.  He  did  not  really  care  very  much 
about  religion,  but  he  wanted  to  give  the  Emperor  real 
power  over  all  Germany,  and  this  frightened  the  Protestant 
princes  very  much,  for  till  this  time  they  had  been  like  little 
kings  in  their  own  states.  Wallenstein's  soldiers  loved  him 
and  were  proud  of  him. 

He  won  many  victories,  and  the  Protestants  were  almost 
in  despair  when  the  great  Protestant  king  of  Sweden, 
Gustavus  Adolphus,  crossed  with  an  army  into  Germany  to 
help  the  Protestants.  The  king  of  Sweden  was  afraid  that 
if  the  Emperor  got  real  power  over  the  Northern  states  of 
Germany,  as  far  as  the  Baltic,  he  would  then  threaten 
Sweden.  Gustavus  Adolphus  was  a  very  earnest  Protestant 
too.     When  he  landed  in  Germany  the  Protestants  crowded 


364 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


to  follow  him.  At  first  he  was  victorious  everywhere.  He 
encouraged  his  men  by  telling  them  that  '  a  good  Christian 
could  never  be  a  bad  soldier.' 

At  first  he  did  not  fight  against  Wallenstein  but  against 
another  general  named  Tilly.  But  at  last  he  met  Wallenstein 
at  the  great  battle  of  Lutzen.  Even  here  the  Swedes  were 
really  victorious,  but  towards  the  end  of  the  battle  a  thick 

fog  covered  the  armies,  and  in 
the  darkness  Gustavus  Adol- 
phus,  'the  Lion  of  the  North,' 
was  killed. 

He  had  said  *  Good-bye '  to 
his  people  before  he  left  Sweden, 
holding  his  little  daughter  Chris- 
tina, who  was  only  three  years 
old,  in  his  arms.  She  was  now 
queen  of  Sweden,  but  when  she 
grew  up  she  became  a  Catholic 
and  so  gave  up  her  crown.  She 
lived  most  of  her  time  in  Italy, 
and  was  one  of  the  cleverest 
women  of  her  time. 

In  a  little  over  a  year  after 
the  battle  of  Lutzen,  Wallen- 
stein was  murdered.  He  had 
always  wanted  to  have  things  very  much  his  own  way,  and 
the  Emperor  was  afraid  that  he  might  even  turn  against  him, 
and  as  the  general  could  make  the  soldiers  do  anything  he 
wished,  this  would  have  been  very  dangerous.  So  Wallen- 
stein was  declared  a  traitor,  and  soon  after  some  men,  hoping 
to  please  the  Emperor  for  whom  he  had  done  so  much, 
murdered  him. 

After  this  the  war  went  on  for  many  years.  The  French, 
under  the  great  Cardinal  Richelieu,  helped  the  Protestants, 
although  of  course  France  was  a  Catholic  country.  He  did 
this  to  keep  Germany  weak,  for  in  the  seventeenth  century 


^ 

C^l 

^M 

^^m 

^^i^Ssx 

^^^T^^^ 

#3 

^^Mf^ 

^iJ>-~^~>- 

^^f" 

f 

L 

A    SOLDIER    OF    THE    THIRTY    YEARs' 
WAR 


THE  SEVENTEENTH  CENTURY  365 

there  were  only  a  few  statesmen  like  Gustavus  Adolphus 
who  were  really  fighting  for  religion.  The  others  made  it 
an  excuse  to  bring  about  things  that  they  wanted.  At  last, 
when  peace  was  made  by  the  Treaty  of  Westphalia  in  1648, 
things  were  not  altered  very  much.  The  Northern  states 
remained  Protestant  and  the  Southern  states  Catholic.  The 
son  of  the  Elector  iFrederick,  who  was  now  dead,  got 
half  of  his  Palatinate  back,  but  Bohemia  remained  to  the 
Emperor. 

After  this  the  Emperor  had  less  power  than  ever  in  the 
empire.  He  became  really  the  ruler  of  Austria  with  Hungary 
and  Bohemia,  the  countries  which  still  belong  to  the  emperor 
of  Austria.  The  little  states  of  the  North  and  West  of 
Germany  remained  separate  until  two  hundred  years  later 
the  ruler  of  one  of  them,  Prussia,  which  had  grown  stronger 
and  stronger,  won  the  rule  of  the  others  and  so  began  the 
German  empire  of  to-day. 

In  the  seventeenth  century  all  the  rulers  in  the  countries 
of  Europe  were  really  absolute.  That  is  to  say,  neither  the 
people  nor  the  nobles  had  any  power,  but  had  to  do  just  what 
the  kings  ordered.  In  many  countries,  in  the  Middle  Ages, 
there  had  been  the  beginning  of  parliaments,  in  which  the 
people  had  power  to  help  in  the  government  of  their  country. 
But  only  in  England  had  this  power  grown.  In  England, 
too,  parliament  had  lost  much  of  its  power  under  the 
absolute  rule  of  the  Tudor  kings.  Still,  parliaments  did 
meet,  and  even  the  Tudor  kings  pretended  at  least  to  take 
the  advice  of  parliament,  though  really  the  parliaments 
passed  any  laws  which  the  king  ordered  them  to. 

But  towards  the  end  of  Queen  Elizabeth's  reign,  the 
parliament  several  times  sent  very  plain  messages  to  the 
Queen.  They  complained  of  the  way  in  which  she  gave 
some  of  her  favourites  'monopolies,'  that  is,  the  right  to 
trade  in  certain  things.  When  a  *  monopoly '  was  granted 
no  other  person  could  sell  that  thing,  and  the  favourite  could 
charge  almost  any  price  he  liked.     This  was  very  hard  on 


366  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WOKLD 

the  people,  but  when  parliament  complained  EHzabeth  was 
wise  enough  to  give  way. 

But  when  James  i.  came  to  the  throne  troubles  began 
between  the  king  and  parliament,  and  when  his  son 
Charles  i.  became  king  a  real  struggle  began,  which  ended 
in  the  '  Great  Civil  War.' 


The  Great  Civil  War  in  England 

Charles  i.  became  king  of  England  in  the  year  1625.  He 
was  a  handsome  man  and  very  good  and  religious.  He 
married  a  Catholic  princess,  Henrietta  Maria  of  France,  and 
he  always  loved  her  and  his  children  very  much.  Charles 
was  almost  a  saint  in  some  ways,  but  he  was  not  a  wise  king. 
He  could  never  understand  that  parliament  had  a  right  to 
help  in  the  government  of  the  country.  He  saw  how  other 
kings  ruled  absolutely,  and  he  could  not  understand  why  the 
English  king  should  not  do  the  same. 

Parliament  first  really  began  to  quarrel  with  the  king  about 
religion.  Archbishop  Laud  of  Canterbury  was  a  great  friend 
of  Charles.  He  wanted  to  make  the  Enghsh  Church  very 
much  more  like  the  Catholic  Church  than  it  had  grown  to 
be.  He  was  fond  of  ceremonies,  and  he  had  the  Communion 
table  railed  off  like  an  altar  at  the  east  end  of  the  churches. 
He  said  that  the  sign  of  the  Cross  should  be  used  for  baptizing 
babies. 

The  Puritans  in  the  Church  hated  these  things,  which 
seemed  to  them  'Popish.'  There  were  many  Puritan 
gentlemen  in  the  House  of  Commons,  and  they  complained 
about  these  things  in  an  act  called  the  Petition  of  Right. 
Charles  had  to  give  his  consent  to  the  Petition,  but  he  soon 
sent  the  parliament  away,  and  for  eleven  years  did  without. 
But  the  king  required  money.  Generally  he  had  got  it 
through  'grants'  made  by  the  parliament,  but  now  he  had 
to  get  it  in  some  other  ways.  He  began  to  gather  taxes 
which  had  not  been  used  for  hundreds   of  years,  especially 


THE  SEVENTEENTH  CENTURY  367 

one  called  '  Ship  Money,'  but  even  then  he  could  not  get 
enough. 

The  Scots,  too,  rose  in  rebellion,  because  Archbishop 
Laud  had  tried  to  force  them  to  have  a  new  prayer-book 
which  was  very  like  the  English  prayer-book  read  in  their 
churches.  Scotland  was  now  joined  to  England,  but  had  a 
separate  parliament.  The  Scots  were  much  more  Protestant 
than  the  English,  and  they  hated  the  new  prayer-book. 

On  the  first  Sunday  it  was  to  be  read  in  the  churches,  a 
servant  woman  called  Jenny  Geddes  threw  a  stool  at  the 
head  of  the  preacher  in  St.  Giles's  Cathedral,  Edinburgh,  and 
the  people  had  to  be  turned  out  before  the  service  could  be 
read.  When  the  Scots  rebelled  and  an  army  marched  into 
England,  Charles  had  not  enough  money  to  fight  them,  and 
in  the  end  he  had  to  give  way  about  the  prayer-book.  He 
had  to  call  parliament  again,  and  in  1640  the  '  Long 
Parliament '  met. 

It  was  so  called  because,  it  did  not  really  come  to  an  end 
for  twenty  years,  though  the  friends  of  the  king  left  it, 
and  it  suffered  many  other  changes.  The  Puritans  were 
now  very  angry  against  the  king,  and  tried  to  take  all  power 
out  of  his  hands.  They  tried,  too,  to  get  rid  of  bishops 
altogether  from  the  English  Church,  and  make  it  much  more 
like  the  Calvinistic  Churches  of  Scotland  or  Geneva.  This 
made  many  gentlemen  leave  the  parliament  and  take  the 
king's  part.  The  Earl  of  Strafford,  Charles's  friend  and  chief 
servant,  had  his  head  cut  off.  Archbishop  Laud  was  put  in 
prison,  and  in  the  end  his  head  was  cut  off  too. 

At  last,  in  1642,  the  Great  Civil  War  began.  Nearly  all 
the  great  lords  were  on  the  side  of  the  king,  though  some 
fought  against  him.  Charles  had  splendid  horse  soldiers  to 
fight  for  him  under  his  brave  nephew,  Prince  Rupert.  At 
first  the  two  sides  were  equal,  but  later  Oliver  Cromwell,  a 
Puritan  gentleman,  got  together  a  splendid  army  of  foot 
soldiers.  He  drilled  them  splendidly,  and  would  have  no 
drinking  or   swearing.      They   had    to    be  what    he    called 


368 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


'godly'   men.     They  came  to   be   called  Cromwell's  'Iron- 
sides. ' 

In  the  end  Cromwell  won.  The  king  was  taken  prisoner, 
and  had  his  head  cut  off  in  front  of  the  people  at  Whitehall. 
It  was  chiefly  Cromwell  who  was  determined  that  the  'man 
Charles  Stuart,'  as  he  called  him,  must  be  got  rid  of  in  this 
way.     Many  people  looked  on  Charles  as  a  martyr,  and  he 


THE    EXECUTION    OF    CHARLES    I.    IN    WHITEHALL,    SOXH    JANUARY     l649 

(From  au  engraving  published  in  1649). 


died  very  nobly  and  bravely,  after  saying  good-bye  to  some 
of  his  children. 

On  the  morning  he  was  to  be  executed,  he  put  on  an 
extra  shirt,  saying  with  a  smile  that  he  did  not  wish  to 
tremble  with  the  cold,  for  fear  his  enemies  might  think  that 
he  was  shaking  with  fear. 

His  eldest  son  Charles  escaped  to  France  after  many 
adventures,  and  for  eleven  years  Cromwell  and  the  parlia- 
ment tried  to  govern  England.  Cromwell  tried  to  set  up  a 
republic,  but  he  could  never  get  a  parliament  to  suit  him. 


THE  SEVENTEENTH  CENTURY  369 

and  all  the  time  he  was  really  ruling  like  an  absolute  king. 
There  were  no  more  bishops,  and  the  Puritans  had  things 
all  their  own  way. 

Cromwell  was  a  very  earnest  Protestant.  He  thought 
all  the  time  that  he  was  doing  God's  work.  He  had  many 
wise  plans  for  the  government  of  England,  but  many  of  the 
people  felt  that  he  was  really  more  of  a  tyrant  than  Charles  i. 
had  been.  When  he  died  his  son  was  made  *  Lord  Protector,' 
but  England  was  tired  of  the  new  ways,  and  a  message  was 
sent  to  Prince  Charles,  asking  him  to  come  back  and  govern 
the  country. 

There  was  great  rejoicing  when  King  Charles  ii.  rode  into 
London,  on  the  29th  May  1660.  The  bishops  were  brought 
back,  and  there  began  a  very  merry  time  in  the  history  of 
England. 

After  the  Restoration,  as  the  return  of  Charles  was  called, 
the  Puritans  had  a  very  hard  time,  although  Charles  the 
'  Merry  Monarch '  had  promised  to  give  them  '  liberty  of 
conscience.'  He  could  not  have  been  kind  to  them,  even  if 
he  had  wished,  for  the  new  parliaments,  full  of  love  for  the 
king,  and  angry  at  the  memory  of  the  sorrows  of  his  father, 
were  determined  to  have  their  revenge.  The  bodies  of 
Cromwell  and  two  of  his  friends  were  taken  from  their 
graves  in  Westminster  Abbey  and  hanged  on  the  scaffold. 
They  were  buried  again,  but  of  course  not  in  the  Abbey. 

Charles  ii.  was  always  very  careful  not  to  interfere  with 
the  rights  of  parliament,  and  so  England  was  the  one  country 
whose  government  left  some  power  to  the  people.  Later, 
when  the  peoples  of  other  countries  rose  up  and  fought  for 
power,  they  imitated  the  English  government,  so  that  our 
parliament  is  often  called  the  'Mother  of  Parliaments.' 

The  Puritans  could  no  longer  preach,  or  teach,  or  meet 
together  for  prayers  or  services.  Those  who  did  so  were 
thrown  into  prison. 

One  of  the  most  remarkable  men  who  was  put  into  prison 
at  this  time  was  John  Bunyan,  the  son  of  a  Bedford  tinker. 

2  a 


370  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

He  was  a  very  good  and  religious  young  man,  but  he  tortured 
himself  over  his  sins,  the  worst  of  which  were  dancing  on  the 
village  green  or  ringing  the  church  bells.  To  the  Puritans 
nearly  every  amusement  was  a  sin,  and  Bunyan  thought 
himself  very  wicked  because  he  loved  these  things.  But  in 
the  end  he  gave  them  up  and  became  a  preacher.  He  was 
put  in  prison  after  the  Restoration,  and  in  Bedford  Jail  he 
wrote  the  wonderful  book  called  the  Pilgrims  Progress, 
which  tells  the  story  of  how  a  man  named  Christian  travelled 
to  the  Celestial  City,  and  all  he  suffered  on  the  way. 
But  it  is  really  the  story  of  any  soul  which  is  struggling 
to  get  rid  of  sin  and  find  peace. 

John  Bunyan  was  not  an  educated  man,  but  he  wrote 
simple  and  beautiful  English,  and  his  book  is  still  read  by 
every  one  to-day.  John  Bunyan  was  the  great  Puritan  prose 
writer,  but  the  Puritans  had  their  great  poet  too.  This  was 
the  blind  poet,  John  Milton,  whose  greatest  work  was  a 
wonderful  long  poem  called  Paradise  Lost. 

But  many  Puritans  fled  over  seas  to  a  land  where  some 
who  believed  as  they  did  had  already  made  their  homes.  It 
will  be  interesting  to  hear  something  of  their  story. 


CHAPTER  XXXV 

THE  PILGRIM  FATHERS 

When  the  English  Puritans  found  that  they  could  not 
worship  God  peacefully  in  their  own  way  at  home,  many  of 
them  made  up  their  minds  to  sail  away  to  America,  and  make 
new  homes  for  themselves  there,  and  so  be  free  to  worship  as 
they  pleased. 

The  colonization  of  North  America  by  the  English  had 
already  begun.  It  had  been  very  difficult  indeed.  The  first 
man  who  had  tried  to  set  up  a  colony  there  was  Sir 
Humphrey  Gilbert,  who  took  men  and  ships  to  Newfound- 
land, but  everything  went  wrong  and  soon  the  men  begged 
to  be  taken  home.  It  was  the  stormy  time  of  the  year,  and 
the  smaller  of  the  two  ships,  which  were  all  that  were  left, 
was  really  not  fit  to  cross  the  sea  at  such  a  time.  But 
Sir  Humphrey  sailed  in  this.  One  night  the  ship  went 
down  in  a  storm,  but  the  men  on  the  other  ship  told  how 
they  saw  Sir  Humphrey  sitting  calmly  with  his  Bible  in 
his  hands  comforting  his  men  as  the  ship  went  down. 

The  next  attempt  was  made  by  Sir  Humphrey  Gilbert's 
brother-in-law,  Sir  Walter  Raleigh,  one  of  the  cleverest  and 
handsomest  of  the  courtiers  of  Queen  Elizabeth,  and  a  great 
favourite  of  the  Queen  until  the  last  years  of  her  reign,  when 
he  fell  into  disgrace. 

But  while  he  was  still  in  her  favour,  he  sent  out  two  ships 
to  find  a  spot  on  the  coast  of  North  America  suitable  for  a 
colony.  The  captains  sailed  like  Columbus  to  the  West 
Indies,  and  then  along  the  coast  to  a  place  a  hundred  miles 
north.     It  was  a  beautiful  spot  with  forests  filled  with  birds. 


372  TTTE  S^PORY  OF  TUK  WORLD 

and  «ifrnpcs  growing  in  the  open  air.  When  the  e.-iptains 
came  baek  and  told  Ualeigh  ahout  it,  lie  said  that  his  new 
eoh)ny  shoidd  be  called  Virginia  alter  Kli/aheth,  the  virgin 
(pieen. 

Kaleigh  did  not  go  hiniself  to  his  colony  though  he  h;id 
been  on  voyages  before  to  America.  1 1  is  often  said  that  it 
was  Sir  Walter  Haleigh  who  brought  the  potato  plant  to 
Ireland  and  first  smoked  tobacco  in  Kngland,  but  it  was 
probably  Sir  John  Hawkins  who  did  both  these  things, 
thoui»h  Sir  Walter  was  a  <?rc;it  smoker  too. 

Hut  these  lirst  colonists  in  Virginia  did  not  want  to  work 
hard.  IMiey  were  always  dreaming  of  gold,  and  gold  was 
not  to  be  found  in  North  America  so  easily  as  in  the  South. 
So  one  day  when  Sir  Francis  Drake  sailed  up  with  food 
and  men  for  the  coh)ny,  the  colonists  begged  to  be  taken 
home.  Kaleigh  did  not  desj)air,  but  sent  out  more  colonists, 
this  time  with  women  to  make  the  homes  comfortable.  A 
baby  was  born  in  Virginia,  and  was  called  Virginia  too,  but 
these  colonists  soon  came  back  also. 

Raleigh  did  not  try  again,  lie  spent  the  last  years  of  his 
lite  as  a  prisoner  in  the  Tower  of  London.  It  liad  been  said 
that  he  had  plotted  against  King  .lames  i.  when  he  first  came 
lo  FjUgland,  and  he  was  condenmed  to  death,  but  kept  in 
prison  instead.  While  there  he  wrote  in  very  line  Knglish 
part  of  the  Ilistorii  of  the  If^orld,  but  it  was  never  linished. 

Kaleigh  was  always  dreaming  of  his  old  adventures.  Men 
in  those  days  told  of  a  wonderful  city  full  of  gold  in  Guiana 
in  South  America.  Pliey  called  it  Fl  Dorado.  Kaleigh 
begged  King  .lames  to  give  him  ships  to  go  to  find  this  city 
and  bring  back  gold,  .lames  allowed  him  to  go,  but  said  he 
umst  not  go  near  the  land  of  the  Spaniards,  lie  must  have 
known  that  this  was  ridiculous,  but  he  was  pretending  to  be 
friendly  with  S|)ain.     Sir  Walter  went,  but  fell  ill  on  the  way. 

When  he  reached  the  mouth  of  the  great  river  Orinoco,  he 
sent  his  young  son  Walter  on  with  some  of  the  men  up  the 
river  to  lind  the  mine ;  but  the  Spaniards  attacked  them  and 


THE  PILGRIM  FATHERS 


373 


*  little  Wat,'  as  Sir  Walter  fondly  called  his  son,  was  killed. 
No  gold  was  found,  and  Raleigh  came  back  broken-hearted  to 
England.  The  Spaniards  complained  to  James,  and  though 
he  would  have  been  only  too  pleased  to  forgive  him  if  he  had 
brought  home  the  gold,  James,  to  please  the  Spaniards,  said 
he  should  have  his  head  cut  oif  after  all.     And  so  he  had. 


THE    FIRST    ENGLISH    SETTLEMENT    IN    VIRGINIA 
(From  a  drawing  by  an  artist  who  went  with  Raleigh's  expedition  to  Virginia  in  1558). 

He  died  like  the  brave  man  he  was,  and  though  he  had  not 
been  a  great  favourite  with  the  people  in  the  last  years  of  his 
life,  every  one  was  sorry  for  him,  and  felt  that  the  English 
king  had  not  been  just  to  the  man  who  had  loved  England  so 
much. 

Raleigh  had  said,  *  I  shall  yet  live  to  see  Virginia  an 
English  nation,'  and  before  his  death  new  attempts  were 
being  made  to  found  a  real  colony  that  would  last  in  Virginia. 

During  Elizabeth's  time  great  riches  had  come  to  England, 


374  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

and  the  richer  people  and  the  people  of  the  middle  class  had 
begun  to  live  much  more  comfortably.  New  and  bigger 
houses  were  built,  and  windows  of  glass,  which  had  been  very 
uncommon,  now  became  quite  common.  Even  Erasmus,  who 
was  used  to  the  great  poverty  of  many  students  at  the  foreign 
universities,  had  complained  of  the  dirtiness  of  the  floors  in 
English  houses,  and  the  Spaniards  at  Queen  Mary's  court  had 
said  that  the  English  had  their  houses  'built  of  sticks  and 
dirt,'  though  they  ate  like  kings.  In  Elizabeth's  time  chimneys 
were  put  into  the  houses,  and  there  was  more  air  and  chance 
of  the  people  being  healthy.  Carpets  were  used  instead  of 
the  old  floor  coverings  of  rushes,  which  had  often  been  very 
dirty. 

In  the  Middle  Ages  people  had  slept  with  logs  of  wood 
for  their  pillows,  except  the  very  rich  people,  but  in 
Elizabeth's  time  even  poor  people  had  bolsters  or  pillows, 
and  the  rich  used  feather  beds,  though  these  were  thought 
great  treasures.  Instead  of  the  old  wooden  plates,  people 
now  began  to  have  silver  or  pewter,  and  glasses  to  drink 
from. 

But  while  the  rich  grew  richer,  the  poor  grew  poorer. 
This  had  been  so  ever  since  the  destruction  of  the  monasteries 
by  King  Henry  viii.,  though  there  were  other  causes  for 
it.  At  the  end  of  Elizabeth's  reign  the  first  *  Poor  Law  '  was 
passed,  which  made  the  people  of  each  town  or  village  pay 
*  rates '  to  buy  food  for  the  poor  people  who  could  not  earn 
their  living. 

It  was  partly  this  perhaps  which  made  Englishmen  leave 
England,  and  try  to  earn  their  living  in  America.  At  the 
beginning  of  James  i.'s  reign,  another  little  band  of  English- 
men, one  hundred  and  forty  altogether,  sailed  in  three  ships 
to  try  once  more  to  make  a  colony  in  Virginia.  A  poet 
wished  them  good  luck, 

'  To  get  the  pearl  and  gold, 
And  Ours  to  hold 
Virginia,  Earth's  only  Paradise.' 


THE  PILGRIM  FATHERS  375 

But  again  it  was  this  wish  for  gold  which  nearly  ruined  the 
new  colony.  They  landed  at  the  mouth  of  the  Chesapeake 
river,  and  they  called  the  town  which  they  built  Jamestown 
after  King  James  i.  Only  a  few  of  the  men  were  used  to 
work,  and  the  same  thing  happened  as  before.  There  was 
not  much  food,  and  the  men  began  to  die.  The  Indians,  too, 
attacked  them. 

John  Smith,  the  First  Great  English  Colonist 

At  last  a  young  man  named  John  Smith,  a  very  strong 
and  determined  person,  made  himself  the  leader  or  captain. 
He  defended  the  town  against  the  Indians,  and  led  little 
groups  of  men  in  hunting  expeditions  to  bring  back  food. 
He  was  once  taken  prisoner  by  the  Indians,  and  led  away  to 
their  king.  His  head  was  laid  on  a  stone,  and  the  Indians 
were  just  going  to  kill  him  with  great  wooden  weapons  when 
a  little  Indian  girl  called  Pocahontas,  the  daughter  of  the 
king,  rushed  forward  and  put  her  head  on  his.  So  the  king 
let  him  off,  and  he  was  taken  back  to  his  colony. 

At  last,  through  his  great  courage  and  the  way  he 
managed  his  men,  the  colony  began  to  do  well.  He  made 
every  one  work  six  hours  a  day,  and  he  made  a  rule  that  any 
one  who  swore  should  have  a  can  of  cold  water  poured  down 
his  sleeve.  This  made  the  men  laugh  very  much.  It  was 
now  seen  that  work  was  the  secret  of  success.  Hundreds 
more  men  with  their  wives  and  children  went  out  to  the 
colony,  and  so  Virginia  was  the  first  successful  English  colony. 
It  soon  set  up  its  own  little  parliament  called  the  House  of 
Burgesses. 

It  was  not  a  Puritan  colony,  but  kept  the  religion  of  the 
English  Church  and  used  the  prayer-book.  Soon  the  land 
was  divided  into  large  estates.  Younger  sons  of  English 
gentlemen  went  out  and  became  'planters.'  The  thing  they 
grew  chiefly  was  tobacco.  Many  negroes  were  bought  to 
work  on  the  plantations. 

There  were  some  poor  white  people  too,  and  some  were 


376  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

even  used  as  slaves,  but  there  were  not  many  of  them  and 
generally  they  were  allowed  to  go  free.  They  did  not  require 
much  to  keep  them  in  such  a  mild  country,  and  lived  idly  and 
happily  enough. 

The  second  great  English  colony  in  North  America  had  a 
very  different  beginning.  It  was  a  Puritan  colony.  When 
James  i.  came  to  England,  the  Puritans,  who  had  been 
persecuted  under  Elizabeth,  hoped  that  they  would  now  be 
well  treated  by  a  king  who  had  been  brought  up  in  Scotland. 
But  James  was  quite  tired  of  the  Scottish  religion,  which  did 
not  show  enough  respect  to  kings.  He  was  never  tired  of 
saying  that '  no  bishop '  meant  '  no  king.'  The  Puritans  were 
very  disappointed,  and  soon  after  the  beginning  of  James's 
reign  the  people  of  a  church  at  Scrooby  in  Nottinghamshire 
made  up  their  minds  to  go  to  Holland,  where  they  would  be 
free  to  worship  as  they  chose. 

But  after  twelve  years  they  decided  to  go  to  America,  and 
so  crossed  over  to  England  again,  and  went  on  board  a  ship 
called  the  31aijflower  and  another  smaller  ship,  and  so  sailed 
off  men,  women,  and  little  children,  with  all  they  possessed, 
to  find  a  home  in  a  new  and  strange  land  for  the  sake  of  their 
religion. 

They  meant  to  land  in  Virginia,  but  after  a  voyage  of 
sixty-four  days,  during  which  they  were  very  crowded 
together  and  miserable,  they  reached  land  far  North  of 
Virginia  and  they  made  their  new  colony  there. 

The  men  built  a  new  town  called  '  Plymouth,'  while  the 
women  and  children  stayed  on  the  ships.  After  a  terrible 
winter,  the  Mayflower  was  ready  to  sail  back  to  England,  but 
not  one  of  the  colonists  wanted  to  go  back  with  her. 

As  time  went  on,  new  settlers  joined  the  colony,  and 
Plymouth  became  the  chief  town  of  the  great  colony  of 
Massachusetts,  a  name  which  was  taken  from  the  Indians. 
The  memory  of  the  '  Pilgrim  Fathers,'  as  the  first  settlers  in 
this  great  Puritan  colony  were  afterwards  called,  is  honoured 
by  all  the  world  to-day. 


THE  PILGRIM  FATHERS  377 

As  time  went  on,  new  colonies  were  formed  in  New 
England,  as  the  lands  round  Massachusetts  where  the 
English  were  settling  were  called.  Some  were  started  by 
people  anxious  to  grow  rich,  but  the  greater  number  of 
colonists  were  people  who  left  England  in  order  to  be  free  to 
worship  as  they  pleased.  Before  the  end  of  King  James  i.'s 
reign,  an  English  nobleman  called  Lord  Baltimore,  who  had 
become  a  Catholic,  started  a  colony  for  Catholics.  His  son 
governed  it  after  him,  and  it  was  called  Maryland,  after  King 
Charles  i.'s  Catholic  Queen,  Henrietta  Maria. 

But  England  was  not  the  only  country  which  had  sent 
out  colonists  to  this  part  of  America.  After  its  great 
struggle  with  Spain,  the  little  republic  of  Holland  had 
become  very  rich  and  important  indeed.  In  fact,  it  became 
the  most  important  country  of  all  on  the  seas.  The  first  half 
of  the  seventeenth  century  was  the  great  time  in  the  history 
of  the  Dutch,  just  as  the  sixteenth  century  was  the  great  time 
of  Spain  and  the  later  seventeenth  century  the  great  time  of 
France.  The  Dutch  ships  had  nearly  all  the  trade  of  the 
world.  Even  when  merchants  of  other  countries  bought 
things  from  far-off  lands,  they  got  Dutch  ships  to  carry  them, 
so  that  Holland  had  what  was  called  the  '  carrying  trade '  of 
the  world. 

And  just  as  other  countries  at  their  great  times  have  had 
great  writers  or  poets  or  philosophers  or  painters,  so  in  the 
seventeenth  century  the  Dutch  painters  were  the  greatest  in 
Europe.  The  chief  of  them  were  Rubens,  Rembrandt,  and 
Van  Dyck,  the  great  portrait-painter  who  painted  portraits 
of  Charles  i.  and  his  children  and  many  of  the  great  English- 
men of  his  time. 

But  the  English,  too,  were  now  very  great  at  sea  since 
their  victories  over  Spain,  and  they  made  up  their  minds 
to  become  even  greater  than  Holland.  And  so  a  great 
struggle  began  under  Cromwell.  Cromwell  had  a  Navigation 
Act  passed  by  which  things  brought  from  other  countries 
could  only  come  in  English  ships.     Before  this  the  Dutch 


378 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


ships  had  done  a  great  trade  between  England  and  America 
or  the  East,  and  the  new  Act  was  very  bad  for  their  trade. 
They  were  very  angry,  and  soon  a  war  broke  out  between  the 
two  countries.  In  the  battles  which  followed,  sometimes  the 
great  Dutch  Admiral  Tromp  and  at  other  times  the  brave 
English  Admiral  Blake  was  victorious. 


A    SEA-FIGHT    BETWEEN    ADMIRAL    BLAKE    AND    THE    DUTCH 

(From  a  seventeenth-century  engraving). 

After  Cromwell  and  Tromp  and  Blake  were  all  dead, 
the  struggle  still  went  on.  The  Dutch  had  an  even  greater 
admiral  than  Tromp,  named  Ruyter,  and  on  the  English 
side  Prince  Rupert  fought  against  him.  Once  after  a  victory, 
Admiral  Tromp  had  tied  a  broom  to  his  mast  and  said  he 
would  sweep  England  from  the  seas.  But  after  all,  Holland 
was  only  a  very  little  country,  and  in  the  end  England 
won  the  command  of  the  seas  and  has  kept  it  ever  since. 


THE  PILGRIM  FATHERS  379 

Holland,  too,  had  sent  out  colonists  to  North  America, 
and  their  land,  called  the  New  Netherlands,  lay  between  the 
colonies  of  New  England  and  Virginia.  Its  chief  town  was 
called  New  Amsterdam.  But  during  the  war  between  the 
two  countries,  the  Enghsh  took  New  Amsterdam,  and  when 
peace  was  made  they  were  allowed  to  keep  it.  Its  name  was 
changed  to  New  York,  after  James,  Duke  of  York,  the  brother 
of  King  Charles  ii.,  who  became  king  of  England  afterwards 
and  was  called  James  it.  New  York,  which  is  the  greatest 
town  in  America  to-day,  now  became  the  capital  of  a  great 
English  colony. 

The  last  of  the  colonies  founded  in  North  America,  for 
the  sake  of  religion,  was  Pennsylvania.  It  was  founded  at 
the  end  of  the  reign  of  Charles  ii.  by  William  Penn,  a  Quaker. 
The  Quakers  were  looked  upon  as  very  dangerous  people 
indeed,  even  worse  than  the  Puritans.  They  lived  very  strict 
lives,  always  dressing  very  plainly.  They  thought  it  wrong 
to  take  an  oath  or  to  become  soldiers,  and  many  men  among 
them  who  would  not  fight  against  the  Dutch  were  put  in 
prison  and  even  whipped. 

At  last  William  Penn,  a  Quaker  gentleman,  got  the  king 
to  let  him  have  some  land  near  New  York  for  a  colony  of 
Quakers.  He  wanted  to  call  the  new  colony  Sylvania,  or 
the  '  Land  of  Woods,'  but  the  people  said  it  must  be  called 
after  him,  and  so  it  was  called  Pennsylvania. 

There  were  thirteen  colonies  altogether  in  North  America 
at  the  end  of  the  seventeenth  century.  The  Northern 
colonies  were  different  in  some  ways  from  the  Southern.  They 
did  not  grow  tobacco  on  large  plantations,  but  were  divided 
into  farms.  There  were  not  many  negro  slaves  there,  because 
they  were  not  so  much  needed.  Most  of  the  colonists  treated 
the  Indians  very  badly  except  the  people  of  Pennsylvania, 
and  they  began  to  die  out.  To-day  there  are  only  a  few 
hundred  of  the  redskins  left.  It  is  a  pity  in  some  ways,  for 
some  of  them  were  very  simple  and  gentle  people,  though 
others  were  fierce  and  cruel. 


380  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD  | 

Although  so  many  colonies  were  begun  by  men  who 
wanted  freedom  of  religion,  each  colony  had  its  own  religion, 
and  people  who  believed  in  a  different  religion  were  not 
allowed  to  live  there,  except  in  the  one  little  colony  of  Rhode 
Island,  which  tolerated  all  religions  like  the  little  kingdom  of 
Holland  did.  People  at  the  time  thought  very  little  about 
these  colonies,  yet  from  them  grew  the  great  country  of  the 
United  States,  where  so  many  millions  of  Enghsh  people  live 
to-day. 


CHAPTER  XXXVI 

THE  AGE  OF  LOUIS  XIV. 

In  the  year  1643,  the  year  after  the  Great  Civil  War  broke 
out  in  England,  a  little  French  prince,  only  four  years  old, 
became  king  of  France.  A  story  is  told  that  as  his  father 
lay  dying  the  child  had  said  to  him,  '  I  am  Louis  xiv.,' 
and  the  father  answered,  '  Not  yet.' 

The  little  Louis  xiv.  grew  up  to  be  a  very  remarkable 
king,  but  he  was  always  thinking  about  himself,  just  as  he 
had  done  when  he  was  only  four  years  old  and  standing  beside 
his  dying  father.  All  the  time  that  Louis  was  growing  up 
Cardinal  Mazarin  was  doing  his  best  to  go  on  with  the  work 
of  Cardinal  Richelieu  and  make  France  the  greatest  country 
in  Europe. 

They  did  their  work  so  well,  that  by  the  time  King 
Louis  XIV.  was  old  enough  to  rule  France  himself,  France 
was  very  great  indeed,  so  great  that  at  last  it  seemed  that 
the  thing  which  people  were  always  trying  to  prevent  had 
happened,  and  that  the  'Balance  of  Power'  in  Europe  was 
upset.  In  the  end  nearly  all  the  countries  of  Europe  were 
joined  together  to  fight  France.  Louis  xiv.  was  not  really 
a  clever  man.  He  was  very  vain  and  self-willed,  yet  even 
his  great  idea  of  his  own  importance  and  his  determination 
to  make  other  people  feel  it,  did  help  to  make  France 
great. 

Under  Louis  French  trade  was  made  much  better,  and 
for  the  first  time  France  had  a  good  navy,  which  became  for 
a  short  time  as  great  as  either  the  English  or  the  Dutch 
navies.     Louis  looked  on  himself  as  the  centre  of  France, 


382  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

the  sun  from  which  everything  drew  its  brightness  and  even 
its  life.  He  took  the  sun  as  his  emblem  and  was  often 
called  *  le  Roi  Soleil.' 

Although  Louis  had  not  a  great  mind  he  had  very  fine 
manners,  and  every  one  felt  that  he  was  a  great  king.  He 
could  never  have  done  as  much  for  France  as  the  great 
Cardinals  Richelieu  and  Mazarin  had  done.  It  was  they 
who  gave  France  its  great  time.  There  were  great  writers 
in  France,  because  Richelieu  and  Mazarin  had  made  France 
great,  and  just  as  in  other  countries,  France's  great  time  in 
history  was  also  her  great  time  in  literature. 

But  it  was  Louis  xiv.  who  brought  all  the  greatest  men 
in  France  to  his  court,  and  many  men  from  other  countries 
too,  so  that  the  French  court  became  the  greatest  court  in 
Europe.  French  manners  and  French  art  became  the  fashion 
of  the  time.  Other  people  did  their  best  to  imitate  them, 
so  that  when  we  speak  of  the  Age  of  Louis  xiv.  we  do 
not  mean  a  time  in  the  history  of  France  only,  but  a  time 
when  the  French  led  the  way  in  everything  and  the  other 
countries  followed. 

At  the  court  of  Louis  xiv.  there  were  the  two  great  play- 
writers — Moliere,  who  wrote  comedies,  that  is,  plays  which 
end  happily,  and  Racine,  who  wrote  great  tragedies,  that  is, 
plays  which  end  in  great  sorrow.  There  was  the  philosopher 
Pascal,  and  there  was  La  Fontaine,  who  wrote  Fables,  in 
which  animals  are  made  to  speak  and  do  things  like  men 
and  women.  All  French  children  still  love  to  read  the 
Fables  of  La  Fontaine. 

Louis  XIV.  built  for  himself  the  wonderful  palace  of 
Versailles,  eleven  miles  out  of  Paris.  He  made  the  French 
people  pay  him  a  great  deal  of  money,  so  that  he  could  build 
it.  Visitors  to  Paris  can  still  see  it  to-day  with  its  great 
rooms  and  galleries  covered  with  gilt  and  with  great  mirrors 
all  along  the  walls  of  some  rooms,  while  others  have  pictures 
painted  on  the  walls  by  the  artists  of  the  time. 

The    great   park   of   Versailles   was    filled   with    marble 


THE  AGE  OF  LOUIS  XIV. 


383 


statues  and  wonderful  fountains  which  are  now  turned  on 
on  Sundays,  so  that  the  people  who  come  out  from  Paris 
may  see  how  beautiful  they  are.  For  the  palace  of  Versailles 
is  now  used  as  a  sort  of  museum  and  belongs  to  the  people, 
for  there  are  no  longer  kings  in  France. 

Louis  XIV.  was  not  very  friendly  with  the  Pope.  He 
wanted  the  king  to  have  much  more  power  over  the  Church 
in  France  than  other  Catholic  kings  in  other  countries,  and 
he  had   many   quarrels  with  the   Pope  through  this.     Yet 


THE    GREAT    PALACE    OF    LOUIS    XIV.    AT    VERSAILLES 
(From  a  seventeenth-century  engraving). 


Louis  was  a  very  strict  Catholic,  so  much  so,  that  he  could 
not  bear  to  think  of  the  Huguenots,  who,  since  Henry  iv. 
had  passed  the  Edict  of  Nantes,  had  been  allowed  to  worship 
in  their  own  way.  There  were  thousands  of  Huguenots  in 
the  South  of  France.  They  were  chiefly  middle- class  and 
working  people.  Many  of  them  worked  at  making  things, 
especially  silk,  in  which  France  had  a  great  trade  with  other 
countries. 

Cardinal  Richelieu  had  thought  that  the  Huguenots  had 
too  much  freedom,  not  in  religion  but  in  governing  them- 
selves, and  he  had  taken  away  many  of  their  privileges.  The 
people  of  La  Rochelle,  the  great  Huguenot  town,  had  defied 


384  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

him,  and  he  had  besieged  their  strong  city  for  fourteen 
months.  At  first  they  were  able  to  get  food  from  ships 
which  brought  it  into  their  beautiful  harbour,  but  Richelieu 
built  dykes  right  across  the  harbour  and  no  more  food  could 
be  got  in.  The  people — men,  women  and  children — died  in 
thousands  in  the  streets,  and  there  were  very  few  alive  when 
Richelieu  and  his  king,  Louis  xiii.,  rode  into  the  conquered 
city. 

Still,  the  cardinal  did  not  prevent  the  Huguenots  from 
worshipping  in  their  own  way.  La  Rochelle  had  grown  rich 
and  happy  again  when  Louis  xiv.  suddenly  said  that  he 
would  no  longer  tolerate  Protestants  in  France.  The  Edict 
of  Nantes  was  '  revoked,'  and  the  freedom  it  had  given 
taken  away.  The  Huguenot  churches  were  knocked  down, 
and  children  were  taken  away  from  parents  who  would  not 
promise  to  bring  them  up  as  Catholics.  Some  of  the 
Huguenots  were  put  to  death,  others  were  sent  to  work  as 
galley  slaves  in  the  French  war  ships.  They  were  chained 
to  their  oars  so  that  they  could  not  escape. 

Many  of  the  Huguenots  made  up  their  minds  to  flee 
away  to  Protestant  countries,  but  even  this  was  made  very 
hard  for  them.  The  shores  of  France  were  watched,  and 
so  were  the  chief  roads  into  other  countries.  Still,  many 
thousands  did  get  away,  crossing  into  Switzerland  and 
Holland  and  Germany,  through  forests  and  over  mountains, 
where  the  king  could  not  put  soldiers  to  stop  them. 

Often  the  Huguenots  disguised  themselves,  so  that  no 
one  could  tell  who  they  were.  One  officer  and  his  wife 
dressed  themselves  as  orange- sellers,  and  travelled  with  a 
donkey  carrying  their  oranges.  Sometimes  people  hid  them- 
selves in  empty  barrels,  and  were  carried  on  to  ships  sailing 
for  England.  So  many  got  away,  though  some  were  caught 
and  taken  back.  Louis  xiv.  got  his  way,  and  soon  there 
was  hardly  a  Protestant  left  in  France,  but  it  was  a  very 
bad  thing  for  the  country. 

Many  French  silk- weavers  settled  down  at  Spitalfields  in 


THE  AGE  OF  LOUIS  XIV.  385 

London,  and  helped  to  make  English  trade  better  as  others 
did  in  other  countries.  Many  sailed  away  to  America, 
finding  peace  and  freedom  like  the  English  colonists  before 
them.  Others  went  to  settle  in  the  colony  which  the  Dutch 
had  set  up  at  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope. 

All  the  countries  of  Europe  were  full  of  horror  at  this 
persecution  of  the  French  Protestants.  The  Pope  himself 
blamed  Louis  for  it.  Only  James  ii.,  the  Catholic  brother 
of  Charles  ii.,  and  now  king  of  England,  was  pleased. 
Charles  ii.,  England's  'Merry  Monarch,'  had  always  been 
much  loved  by  the  English  people,  but  he  had  not  really  been 
very  faithful  to  them.  He  had  made  secret  promises  to 
Louis  XIV.  to  try  and  make  England  Catholic  again,  and 
in  return  Louis  had  given  him  a  great  deal  of  money. 
But  Charles  ii.  was  wise  enough  to  see  that  he  could  not 
really  do  this.  It  is  said  that  he  died  a  Catholic  himself, 
but  he  never  really  had  any  hope  of  making  the  English 
Catholic. 

James  ii.  was  quite  different.  He  was  a  very  strict 
Catholic,  and  though  Catholics  were  forbidden  by  the 
English  law  to  help  in  the  government  of  the  country, 
James  took  no  notice  of  this,  but  gave  the  best  positions  to 
Catholics. 

This  made  the  English  people  very  angry,  and  when 
James's  queen  had  a  little  baby  born,  they  made  up  their 
minds  to  rebel  against  James,  for  they  knew  that  the  baby 
would  be  brought  up  as  a  Catholic,  and  they  hated  to  think 
that  they  would  have  Catholic  kings  for  ever.  So  they  rose 
in  revolt  against  James,  who  fled  to  France,  where  his  wife 
and  baby  had  gone  before  him. 

Then  the  English  invited  William  of  Orange,  who  had 
married  Mary,  James  ii.'s  grown-up  daughter,  to  come  and 
rule  England  with  his  wife.  And  so  they  did.  This  is 
called  the  English  Revolution  of  1688. 

William  iii.,  as  he  was  now  called,  was  a  descendant  of 
Wilham  the  Silent,  who  had  saved  the  Netherlands  from 

2  B 


386 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


Spain.     He   was   the   ruler   of  Holland,   and   he   was   only 
pleased  to  become  king  of  England,  too,  because  he  wanted 


THE    EMBARKATION    OF    WILLIAM    OF    ORANGE    FROM    HOLLAND    FOR    ENGLAND,   I688 
(After  a  contemporary  painting  now  at  Hampton  Court). 

England  to   help  him   to  save  Holland,   this  time   against 
the  king  of  France. 


The  Wars  of  Louis  xiv. 

For  long  before  this  Louis  had  been  fighting  with 
Holland,  for  he  had  made  up  his  mind  to  join  the 
Netherlands  to  France,  and  make  the  river  Rhine  the 
boundary  of  his  country  on  the  north  as  it  was  on  the  east. 
Louis  had  married  a  Spanish  princess,  who  was  half-sister  to 
Charles  ii.,  the  boy  who  soon  afterwards  became  king  of  Spain. 
When  King  Philip  iv.  of  Spain,  the  father  of  Louis's  wife 
and  of  Charles  ii.  of  Spain,  died,  Louis  said  that  the  Spanish 
Netherlands  ought  to  belong  to  him  because  of  his  wife,  and 
he  immediately  attacked  them.  He  had  a  very  fine  general 
called  Turenne,  and  in  a  short  time  the  French  had  conquered 
all  the  chief  towns  of  the  Spanish  Netherlands  near  France. 


THE  AGE  OF  LOUIS  XIV.  387 

The  other  countries  were  very  anxious  about  the  *  Balance 
of  Power,'  when  they  saw  the  French  winning  town  after 
town,  and  England,  Sweden  and  Holland  joined  in  what  was 
called  the  '  Triple  Alliance,'  to  prevent  Louis  conquering  the 
Netherlands.  So  Louis  stopped  fighting  for  a  time,  but  still 
he  kept  the  towns  he  had  won.  He  soon  broke  up  the  Triple 
Alliance.  He  made  a  secret  treaty  with  Charles  ii.,  and  also 
persuaded  Sweden  not  to  help  the  Dutch.  For  he  had  made 
up  his  mind  now  to  fight  and  conquer  Holland. 

Holland  had  always  been  a  republic,  but  it  had  always 
elected  a  prince  of  the  House  of  Orange  as  its  stadtholder, 
as  the  ruler  was  called.  The  stadtholder  was  not  a  king  but 
a  kind  of  president.  Still,  as  he  was  always  chosen  from  the 
House  of  Orange,  that  house  had  become  a  kind  of  royal 
family.  There  were  some  people  in  Holland  who  did  not 
like  this,  and  wanted  not  to  give  very  much  power  to  the 
young  William  of  Orange,  who  was  then  growing  up.  Two 
brothers  called  De  Witt  were  looking  after  the  country  when 
Louis  XIV.  attacked  it.  The  De  Witts  were  brave  men  and 
loved  their  country,  but  they  had  not  been  wise  enough  to 
see  the  great  danger  Louis  xiv.  was  going  to  be.  The 
Dutch  navy  was  fighting  the  French  and  English  navy  too, 
and  was  not  conquered,  but  the  Dutch  army  was  not  ready 
and  in  order.  As  in  the  days  of  William  the  Silent,  the 
dykes  were  cut,  the  land  w^as  flooded,  and  the  French  driven 
off. 

But  the  people  were  very  angry  with  the  De  Witts.  One 
brother  was  put  in  prison,  and  when  the  other  went  to  visit 
him,  the  two  were  attacked  and  killed. 

WilUam  of  Orange  now  had  things  all  his  own  way.  He 
was  a  brave  soldier  and  very  ambitious.  His  whole  life  from 
this  time  was  given  to  defending  his  country  or  keeping 
down  the  power  of  France.  Yet  he  was  not  really  a  very 
noble  character.  He  did  not  try  to  save  the  De  Witts,  but 
took  no  notice,  as  he  did  many  times  afterwards  when  cruel 
things  were  done  which  he  could  have  prevented.    He  was  a 


388  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

much  more  silent  man  than  the  WilHam  who  had  been  called 
the  Silent. 

This  was  partly  because  of  the  way  he  had  been  brought 
up.  Without  father  or  mother  or  any  near  relation,  the 
T>e  Witts  had  brought  him  up  alone  and  always  watched. 
They  thought  of  him  as  dangerous  to  the  republic  which  they 
loved,  because  the  House  of  Orange  had  become  like  a  royal 
family.  He  had  begged  them  to  let  him  have  children  of  his 
own  age  to  play  with,  but  they  would  not,  and  in  the  end  he 
learned  to  hide  what  he  felt.  He  did  not  smile  at  good  news 
or  cry  for  bad,  and  he  kept  this  quiet  way  till  the  end  of  his 
life.  Yet  when  he  loved  he  loved  passionately,  and  he  hated 
just  as  passionately. 

Above  all  other  things  he  hated  France  and  France's  king. 
For  six  years  there  was  fighting  between  France  and  Holland. 
The  French  generally  won.  Some  one  asked  William,  'Do 
you  not  see  that  your  country  is  lost  ? '  '  There  is  one  way/ 
he  answered,  *  never  to  see  it  lost,  and  that  is  to  die  in  the 
last  ditch.' 

When,  in  1678,  Louis  was  forced  by  the  other  countries  of 
Europe  to  make  peace,  Holland  was  still  free.  For  ten  years 
after  this  there  was  peace,  but  Louis  was  always  offending 
some  one,  and  trying  to  steal  land  on  the  borders  of  France. 
Then  came  the  English  Revolution,  and  William's  great 
chance  as  king  of  England  to  fight  Louis  once  more.  Two 
years  afterwards  the  Dutch  and  English  fleets  won  a  great 
victory  over  the  French  fleet  at  La  Hogue.  This  was  the 
end  of  the  greatness  of  France  on  the  seas. 

Long  after  the  time  of  Louis  xiv.,  France  became  a 
danger  to  Europe  under  the  great  Napoleon,  but  she  was 
never  able  to  get  together  a  really  great  fleet.  But  on  land 
Louis  still  won  victories,  though  William  of  Orange  fought 
so  well  that  Louis  never  got  any  real  gain  from  his  victories. 
At  last  peace  was  made  again  in  1697.  WilHam  of  Orange 
was  given  some  towns  in  the  north  of  the  Spanish  Netherlands,, 
with  which  he   could  keep  Louis  from  attacking  Holland 


THE  AGE  OF  LOUIS  XIV.  389 

again.  He  would  much  rather  have  gone  on  fighting  Louis, 
but  by  this  time  the  English  were  rather  tired  of  it.  They 
thought  that  WiUiam  was  making  use  of  Enghsh  men  and 
English  money  to  save  Holland. 

But  Louis  XIV.  only  made  peace  each  time  so  as  to  be 
able  to  get  ready  for  war  again.  And  now  Louis  was  very 
anxiously  waiting  for  the  death  of  Charles  ii.  of  Spain,  in 
order  to  get  as  much  as  he  could  of  the  land  he  ruled. 

Charles  ii.  had  never  been  strong,  and  people  had  been 
surprised  that  he  had  even  lived  to  be  a  man.  Before  he 
died,  Louis  and  the  Austrian  emperor,  who  was  also  related 
to  the  king  of  Spain,  had  arranged  that  one  of  the  Emperor's 
sons  should  become  king  of  Spain,  while  Louis  was  to  have 
all  the  Spanish  possessions  in  Italy.  No  one  asked  the 
Spanish  people  what  they  wished,  but  when  Charles  ii.  died 
they  made  up  their  mind  that  they  would  not  have  any  king 
who  had  been  chosen  for  them,  but  that  they  would  choose 
their  own.  They  chose  Philip,  the  young  grandson  of 
Louis  XIV.  He  was  only  a  boy  of  seventeen.  Unless  his 
elder  brother  died  he  would  not  become  king  of  France,  and 
in  any  case  Louis  xiv.  had  had  to  promise  that  he  would  not 
join  the  two  countries.  Yet  as  the  young  King  Philip  was 
going  away  homesick  and  crying  to  his  new  kingdom, 
Louis  said  to  him,  *  Remember,  there  are  no  longer  any 
Pyrenees.' 

The  Pyrenees  are  the  mountains  between  France  and 
Spain,  and  Louis  meant  that  after  this  Spain  would  always 
be  joined  to  France  and  help  her  in  her  wars. 

William  of  Orange  was  very  anxious  indeed,  and  he 
wished  with  all  his  heart  that  the  English  people  would  once 
more  declare  war  against  France.  Then  Louis  did  a  foolish 
thing.  Poor  King  James  ii.  of  England  was  dying  in  France, 
and  Louis  xiv.  promised  him  that  he  would  do  all  he  could 
to  have  his  son,  the  little  baby  who  was  born  in  1688,  made 
king  of  England  when  William  of  Orange  should  die.  When 
the  English  people  heard  of  this  they  were  very  angry,  and 


390  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

so  at  last  William  got  his  way,  and  they  gave  him  men  and 
money  to  help  him  to  fight  Louis  once  more. 

But  just  at  this  point  William  died.  He  had  never  been 
very  strong,  and  he  had  worn  himself  out.  Mary,  his  queen, 
was  dead  already,  and  so  her  sister,  Anne,  became  queen  of 
England.  The  son  of  James  ii.  never  had  any  chance  of 
becoming  king  of  England,  although  in  the  year  1715  he 
did  cross  over  to  Scotland,  hoping  to  win  England  with  the 
help  of  the  Scottish  Highlanders,  but  failed  completely. 

He  lived  nearly  all  his  life  in  Italy,  where  he  married  and 
had  children.  He  was  always  very  sad,  and  people  called 
him  '  Old  Mr.  Melancholy.'  He  is  generally  called  the  Old 
Pretender,  because  his  eldest  son,  Bonnie  Prince  Charlie, 
who  came  to  England  in  the  year  1745,  just  thirty  years 
after  his  father,  to  try  to  win  the  throne  of  the  Stewarts 
again,  was  called  the  Young  Pretender. 

When  William  iii.  died,  the  English  soldiers  were  not 
left  without  a  great  leader.  The  duke  of  Marlborough, 
who  was  tutor  to  Queen  Anne's  little  boy,  was  placed  over 
the  army.  He  was  a  wonderful  soldier.  A  great  Frenchman 
said  of  him  that  he  never  besieged  a  place  which  he  did  not 
take,  or  fought  a  battle  that  he  did  not  win.  His  soldiers 
said  that  the  duke  was  '  as  calm  at  the  mouth  of  a  cannon 
as  at  the  door  of  a  drawing-room.'  His  armies  loved  him, 
and  the  sight  of  his  calm,  determined  face  always  made  his 
men  feel  braver. 

In  the  year  1704,  Marlborough  and  Prince  Eugene  of 
Savoy  won  a  great  victory  over  the  French,  at  the  battle  of 
Blenheim  near  the  Danube.  For  Louis  xiv.  had  marched 
through  Germany  to  attack  Vienna,  the  chief  town  of  Austria. 
He  had  an  immense  army,  and  would  have  defeated  the  army 
of  the  Emperor,  but  Prince  Eugene,  who  was  with  his  army 
in  Italy,  marched  quickly  to  meet  the  French,  while 
Marlborough  made  a  more  wonderful  march  still,  across 
Europe  from  Holland.  The  great  French  army  was  defeated 
and  half  its  men  killed  in  the  battle.     Yet  there  was  fighting 


THE  AGE  OF  LOUIS  XIV.  391 

for  some  years  after  this.     At  last,  peace  was  made  in  the 
year  1713. 

After  thirty  years  of  fighting,  Louis  had  gained  nothing. 
His  grandson,  Philip,  kept  Spain,  but  neither  he  nor  any  of 
his  family  who  became  king  after  him  could  become  king 
of  France.  Neither  could  any  French  king  ever  become  king 
of  Spain.  The  Netherlands,  for  which  Louis  had  fought  so 
hard,  were  now  given  up  to  the  House  of  Austria.  Holland 
remained  independent,  and  kept  a  ring  of  Netherland  towns 
to  keep  her  safe.  The  possessions  of  Spain  in  Italy  were 
also  given  to  Austria.  The  town  of  Gibraltar,  on  the  south 
coast  of  Spain,  remained  to  England,  and  the  Island  of 
Minorca  and  the  French  colony  of  Nova  Scotia,  or  New 
Scotland,  which  the  French  had  made  in  Canada,  the  part  of 
North  America  to  the  north  of  New  England,  were  also  given 
up  to  the  English. 

Nova  Scotia  was  only  one  of  the  colonies  of  the  French 
in  North  America,  for  there  was  a  New  France  as  well  as  a 
New  Holland.  There  had  been  quarrels  before  this  about 
Nova  Scotia,  for  the  English  said  it  belonged  to  them,  because 
it  was  first  discovered  by  Cabot,  who  was  sent  out  by  the 
English  king,  Henry  vii.  There  were  quarrels,  too,  about  it 
later,  but  England  kept  it  in  the  end,  and  we  shall  see  later 
how  she  won  all  the  other  French  colonies  in  Canada  as  well. 

Louis  XIV.  died  in  1715.  He  had  lost  all  he  had  fought 
for  in  his  great  wars.  He  spent  the  last  two  years  of  his  life 
very  miserably.  His  eldest  son  and  grandson  died,  which 
made  the  old  king  very  sorrowful.  He  was  still  as  strict  a 
Catholic  as  ever,  and  he  now  persecuted  some  people  called  the 
Jansenists,  who  were  Catholics,  but  had  some  peculiar  beliefs 
which  seemed  like  heresy  to  the  king.  The  convent  of  Port 
Royal,  near  Paris,  where  some  old  nuns  lived,  had  been 
Jansenist  for  many  years,  but  Louis  xiv.  asked  the  nuns  to 
say  that  they  were  not  Jansenist  any  longer. 

They  would  not  do  this,  and  although  they  were  all  old 
ladies,  he   sent  them  off  to  different   convents  all  over  the 


392  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

country.  But  in  spite  of  all  his  faults,  Louis  xiv.  had  worked 
hard  for  France.  '  L'etat  c'est  moi '  ('  I  am  the  state '),  he 
would  often  say.  But  although  there  was  so  much  vanity  in 
his  love  for  France  he  did  love  her.  With  all  his  faults,  too, 
he  was  in  some  ways  the  greatest  man  of  the  seventeenth 
century.  His  death  was  the  end  of  a  great  time  in  the 
history  of  France  and  the  history  of  Europe. 


CHAPTER  XXXVII 

THE  EAST  OF  EUROPE  IN  THE  SEVENTEENTH  CENTURY 

In  the  second  half  of  the  seventeenth  century  the  Turks 
began  once  more  to  trouble  Europe.  They  had  been 
troublesome  in  the  sixteenth  century,  and  Don  John  of 
Austria,  the  brother  of  Philip  ii.  of  Spain,  had  won  a  great 
victory  over  them  in  the  famous  battle  of  Lepanto.  Then 
for  almost  a  hundred  years  they  had  left  the  European 
countries  alone,  chiefly  because  there  was  much  trouble  and 
disorder  in  their  own  empire,  which  now  had  its  capital  at 
Constantinople. 

In  the  year  1656  the  Turks  seized  Transylvania.  It  was 
the  eastern  part  of  the  kingdom  of  Hungary,  but  it  had 
become  an  independent  little  state.  The  Emperor  Leopold 
helped  the  Transylvanians,  and  the  Turks  were  driven  out,  but 
Transylvania  still  had  to  pay  tribute.  But  the  rule  of  the 
Emperor  Leopold  was  much  disliked  in  the  part  of  Hungary 
still  belonging  to  Austria,  and  some  years  later  the 
Hungarians  rebelled.  The  Turks  thought  this  was  a  good 
chance  to  attack  Vienna. 

The  Emperor  begged  John  Sobieski,  the  brave  king  of 
Poland,  to  come  and  fight  for  him.  Sobieski  had  already, 
some  years  before,  fought  against  the  Turks,  who  had  taken 
a  province  from  Poland.  For  the  Turks  had  all  the 
Mohammedan  love  of  conquest,  and  whenever  they  were 
not  weakened  by  disputes  among  themselves,  were  a 
great  danger  to  Eastern  Europe.  They  were  always  brave, 
and  their  great  armies  fought  desperately,  but  fortunately 
they  were  never  disciplined  like  the  armies  of  the  West,  and 

393 


394  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

when  a  European  army  under  a  good  general  fought  with  a 
Turkish  army,  the  Europeans  could  always  win. 

While  the  Austrian  commander  was  waiting  at  Vienna  for 
Sobieski  and  his  army  and  the  Turkish  army  was  coming 
nearer,  he  ordered  that  all  the  houses  in  all  the  suburbs  round 
the  city  should  be  burnt,  rather  than  that  the  Turks  should 
be  able  to  rob  them.  The  Turks  came  up  and  began  to 
besiege  the  city.  The  tents  of  the  Turkish  commander,  made 
of  silk  and  embroidered  in  gold  and  silver  and  with  pearls 
and  jewels,  could  be  seen  by  the  Austrians  as  they  climbed 
the  spire  of  the  cathedral  to  see  if  Sobieski  was  coming,  for 
the  people  were  sick  and  starving.  At  last  he  came,  and  the 
people  in  Vienna  could  see  with  joy  the  fireworks  which  he 
set  off  on  the  top  of  the  hill  four  miles  away. 

In  the  morning  the  Christian  army  under  Sobieski  heard 
Mass,  and  then  a  great  standard  of  red  with  a  white  cross  was 
set  up.  '  We  have  not  come  to  save  a  city,  but  the  whole  of 
Christendom,'  said  Sobieski.  To  him  it  was  a  new  crusade. 
The  Turks  prepared  for  the  battle  by  killing  thousands  of 
prisoners  whom  they  had  already  taken.  Then  they  faced 
the  army  of  Sobieski  as  it  rushed  down  the  hill  upon  them. 
Many  were  killed,  and  the  rest  fled  away.  By  evening  Vienna 
had  been  relieved. 

John  Sobieski  was  as  humble  as  he  was  brave,  and  when 
the  Emperor  thanked  him  afterwards  for  his  help,  he  bowed 
and  said,  '  I  am  glad  to  have  been  able  to  do  you  this  small 
service.' 

The  Turks  still  fought  for  some  years  after  this,  whenever 
the  best  of  the  Austrian  generals  were  busy  fighting  against 
Louis  XIV. ;  but  Prince  Eugene,  who  helped  the  duke  of 
Marlborough  to  win  the  battle  of  Blenheim,  fought  them 
several  times,  and  at  last,  in  1716,  they  made  peace  and  were 
quiet  once  again  for  a  time.  Austria  got  nearly  all  Hungary 
back  again,  and  Poland,  too,  got  its  lost  province  back. 

Prince  Eugene  had  been  helped  in  his  struggle  with  the 
Turks  by  the  ruler  of  Russia,  the  Tsar,  Peter  the  Great. 


EASTERN  EUROPE  IN  THE  17TH  CENTURY    395 


Peter  the  Great 

It  was  under  Peter  the  Great  that  Russia  first  became 
important  among  the  countries  of  Europe.  It  was  a  very 
large  country,  but  it  had  no  sea  coast,  and  the  only  way  its 
people  could  reach  the  West  was  through  Poland.  The 
people  of  Russia  were  chiefly  Slavs,  though  many  Tartars 
had  become  mixed  with  the  people,  and  the  ruling  family 
of  Russia  was  descended  from 
Northern  Vikings. 

For  more  than  two  hundred 
years,  until  the  end  of  the 
fifteenth  century,  the  Russians 
had  been  ruled  by  Mongol  or 
Turkish  conquerors  and  then 
had  become  free  again.  But 
Russia  was  hardly  civilized  at 
all  before  the  days  of  Peter  the 
Great. 

He  was  a  very  wonderful 
man.  He  was  anxious  that 
Russia  should  learn  all  the  things 
which  the  Western  nations 
knew,  and  should  become  im- 
portant among  the  countries  of 

Europe.  Above  all  he  wanted  to  win  the  lands  on  the 
Russian  side  of  the  Baltic  Sea,  which  had  been  won  at 
different  times  by  Sweden.  But  the  sea  could  only  be  useful 
to  him  if  the  Russians  knew  how  to  build  ships,  [so  Peter 
made  up  his  mind  to  go  himself  to  Holland  and  learn  how 
ships  were  built. 

He  sailed  to  a  place  called  Zaandam  in  Holland,  and 
there  he  dressed  himself  like  a  Dutch  boatman  with  a  short 
jacket,  a  red  waistcoat,  and  wide  Dutch  trousers.  He  lived 
in  the  one-roomed  cottage  of  a  Dutch  workman,  whom  he 
had  once  known   in  Russia.     But  he  was  very  noticeable, 


PETER    THE    GREAT    OF    RUSSIA 

(Painted  by  Kneller  when  Peter  visited 
London  in  1698). 


396  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

with  his  tall  figure  and  handsome  face  and  long  curly  hair, 
and  crowds  of  people  began  to  press  round  him  as  he 
watched  the  shipbuilders  at  work,  so  he  fled  away  to 
Amsterdam,  and  was  allowed  to  work  in  the  dockyards 
there. 

He  helped  in  the  building  of  a  ship  from  beginning  to  end, 
and  then  the  city  of  Amsterdam  presented  him  with  it. 
Peter  was  delighted.  He  called  his  new  ship  the  Amsterdam, 
and  sailed  back  with  it  to  Russia.  But  he  did  not  yet 
know  all  he  wanted  to  about  shipbuilding,  and  later,  when 
William  iii.  sent  him  the  present  of  a  ship,  Peter  asked  if  he 
might  come  to  see  the  English  dockyards  too,  and  so  he  did. 

When  he  got  back  again  to  Russia,  he  taught  the 
Russians  how  to  build  ships  too.  Peter  wanted  to  live  as 
near  as  possible  to  the  West,  wliich  he  admired  so  much,  and 
so  at  the  mouth  of  a  river  running  into  the  Baltic  Sea,  he 
built  himself  a  great  new  city  to  be  his  capital  instead  of 
Moscow,  his  capital  in  the  east.  The  new  city  was  called 
St.  Petersburg,  and  it  has  ever  since  been  a  very  important 
and  beautiful  town. 

Peter  got  together  an  army  too,  and  took  back  Scottish 
soldiers  to  help  him  to  train  it  to  fight  like  the  armies  of 
Western  Europe.  Peter  was  quite  absolute,  and  he  easily 
made  the  people  do  things  as  he  wished.  He  was  head  of 
both  Church  and  State  in  Russia.  He  got  some  of  the 
German  states,  which  did  not  like  Sweden  owning  the  Ger- 
man part  of  the  Baltic  coast,  to  join  him  in  winning  all  the 
coast  back  from  Sweden. 

But  the  young  king  of  Sweden  was  a  very  brave  and 
wonderful  person  too.  He  was  called  Charles  xii.  Charles 
was  only  eighteen  years  old  when  he  left  the  Swedish  capital, 
Stockholm,  to  fight  Peter  the  Great  and  his  German  friends. 
He  first  went  against  the  king  of  Denmark,  and  easily 
conquered  him.  He  then  marched  against  the  Russians 
under  Peter  the  Great,  who  were  besieging  Narva,  a  town 
on  the  Baltic.     The  Russian  army  was  not  used  yet  to  war, 


EASTERN  EUROPE  IN  THE  17TH  CENTURY   397 

and  Charles  easily  drove  them  into  disorder,  and  took  Narva. 
Then  he  marched  into  Poland,  and  took  the  throne  from  the 
new  Polish  king,  Augustus  of  Saxony  (for  Sobieski  was  now 
dead),  and  made  the  Poles  elect  a  Polish  noblemen  as  their 
new  king. 

Then  Charles  made  up  his  mind  to  attack  Moscow,  but 
his  men  suffered  terribly  in  the  severe  cold  of  the  Russian 
winter.  Peter  the  Great  did  not  attack  him,  but  fell  on 
the  Swedish  armies  which  came  afterwards  to  join  their 
king  and  destroyed  them.  He  then  marched  across  Russia, 
too,  to  where  Charles  was  besieging  a  place  called  Pultawa. 
Charles  was  wounded  in  one  foot,  and  though  he  tried  not  to 
let  any  one  know,  his  men  saw  blood  dripping  from  his  boot. 
He  could  not  lead  his  army  against  Peter,  but  had  himself 
carried  to  the  battle-field.  But  Peter  won  a  great  battle 
over  the  Swedes  without  their  leader. 

Charles  escaped  into  the  land  of  the  Turks,  and  tried  to 
get  the  Sultan  to  help  him  against  Russia,  but  he  would 
not.  Then  Charles  heard  that  his  possessions  on  the  German 
coast  of  the  Baltic  had  been  taken  by  the  German  princes. 
Peter  the  Great  had  won  the  Eastern  part  of  the  Baltic  coast, 
and  for  a  time  there  was  a  chance  of  his  joining  with  Charles 
to  help  him  to  win  the  German  part  back.  But  Charles 
had  now  to  go  to  Norway,  which  he  hoped  to  join  to  Sweden, 
and  there  he  died  in  1718. 

He  was  only  thirty-six.  When  he  was  a  boy  he  loved  to 
hear  about  wars,  and  especially  about  Alexander  the  Great. 
He  would  say  that  he  wished  he  could  be  like  him.  Some  one 
said  to  him,  '  Yes,  but  he  only  lived  thirty-two  years.'  The 
boy  answered,  '  That  does  not  matter,  when  one  has  won  an 
empire.' 

Charles  xii.  was  not  much  older  than  Alexander  when  he 
died.  He  had  not  won  an  empire,  but  he  had  gained  very 
wonderful  victories.  With  his  death  came  the  end  of 
Sweden's  greatness.  Sweden  was  really  like  Holland,  only 
fit  to   be  a   second-rate  power.     The  one  country  was  too 


398  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

small  and  the  other  too  poor  to  be  long  among  the  most 
important  countries  of  Europe.  But  for  a  time  certain 
peculiar  events  had  made  both  countries  very  great.  Peter 
the  Great  died  seven  years  after  his  great  enemy,  but  Russia 
went  on  becoming  more  important,  and  is  one  of  the  great 
powers  in  Europe  to-day. 


CHAPTER  XXXVIII 

THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY 

At  the  death  of  Louis  xiv.,  a  new  period  seems  to  begin  in 
the  history  of  the  world.  The  eighteenth  century  was  very 
different  in  many  ways  from  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth 
centuries.  People  did  not  even  pretend  now  to  go  to  war 
about  religion.  Yet  there  were  two  very  great  wars  in  the 
middle  of  this  century,  in  which  nearly  all  the  great  countries 
of  Europe  joined.  The  stronger  countries  of  Eastern  Europe 
joined  together  or  fought  with  each  other  to  take  the  land  of 
the  smaller  states,  and  make  their  own  countries  stronger. 
There  was  no  question  of  right  and  wrong.  The  strong 
countries  were  fighting  to  get  as  much  as  they  could.  Kings 
and  queens  have  never  been  so  selfish  before  or  since. 

In  the  wars  of  the  century  England  was  always  against 
France.  The  real  reason  for  this  was  that  both  countries  had 
colonies  in  North  America  and  India,  and  each  wanted  to 
push  the  other  out  of  these  continents.  So  that  while 
English  and  French  armies  were  fighting  in  Europe,  others 
were  fighting  in  North  America  and  India,  and  we  shall  see 
how  in  the  end  England  won  both  these  continents  for 
herself. 

The  people  of  the  eighteenth  century  were  very  fond  of 
amusement  and  dress.  The  richer  people  went  a  great  deal 
to  watering-places  to  drink  the  waters  and  amuse  themselves. 
Many  philosophers  began  not  to  believe  in  God  at  all,  and 
most  people,  even  those  who  went  to  Church,  did  not  bother 
themselves  much  about  religion.  But  there  was  one  good 
side  to   this.     In  England   the  worst  laws  against  Roman 

399 


400  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

Catholics  and  Unitarians  were  no  longer  noticed.  They 
were  not  '  repealed,'  but  they  were  no  longer  put  into 
practice.  The  Unitarians  were  people  who  believed  in  God, 
but  did  not  believe  that  Jesus  Christ  was  God.  After  the 
Revolution  of  1688,  the  'Dissenters,'  as  those  Protestants 
who  had  left  the  English  Church  were  called,  were  freed  from 
persecution,  and  allowed  to  worship  in  their  own  chapels. 

The  dress  of  the  people  everywhere  was  still  very  brightly 
coloured,  and  the  richer  people  had  their  clothes  made  of 
very  beautiful  stuffs.  Men  wore  wigs  often  tied  with  a 
ribbon  at  the  back,  and  ladies  had  their  hair  puffed  out  and 
powdered.  But  in  spite  of  all  their  finery  the  people  of  the 
eighteenth  century  were  still  very  rough,  and  manners  were 
not  nearly  so  refined  as  they  are  to-day.  Even  gentlemen 
who  were  good  scholars  drank  a  great  deal  too  much  wine, 
and  both  men  and  women  had  a  great  passion  for  playing 
cards  for  money. 

Just  as  there  was  no  longer  any  great  enthusiasm  about 
religion,  or  even  about  other  things,  so  there  was  no  really 
great  poetry.  The  best  writers  of  the  time  were  to  be  found 
in  England,  but  poets  like  Alexander  Pope,  who  wrote  poems 
like  the  Essay  on  Man,  might  almost  as  well  have  written  in 
prose.  The  language  was  clever,  and  the  verses  perfect  in 
many  ways,  but  it  was  not  poetical.  There  were  some  very 
great  writers  of  prose,  such  as  Addison,  Steele  and  Swift,  and 
before  the  end  of  the  century  there  were  the  first  real  English 
novels  by  men  like  Henry  Fielding.  But  before  the  end  of 
the  century,  too,  there  was  a  great  change,  which  came  to  a 
head  at  the  beginning  of  the  next  century,  when  many  new 
poets  wrote  poems  full  of  passion. 

In  some  ways  the  people  of  to-day  are  more  different  from 
the  people  of  the  eighteenth  century  than  the  people  of  the 
sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries  were  different  from  those 
of  the  Middle  Ages. 

The  first  great  war  of  the  eighteenth  century  was  called 
the  War  of  the  Austrian  Succession.     Charles#};.^  the  emperor 


if 

THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY  401 

of  Austria,  had  died.  He  had  no  sons,  and  he  left  Austria 
and  all  his  possessions  to  his  beautiful  young  daughter,  Maria 
Theresa.  Some  of  these  possessions  had  never  had  a  woman 
ruling  over  them  before,  but  Charles  vi.  had  written  a  kind  of 
law  which  was  called  the  'Pragmatic  Sanction,'  saying  that  his 
daughter  should  rule  after  him  in  all  his  possessions. 

Nearly  all  the  other  countries  agreed  to  the  Pragmatic 
Sanction,  though  France  would  not,  and  so  when  her  father 
died  Maria  Theresa  became  Empress  of  Austria,  queen  of 
Hungary  and  Bohemia,  and  ruler  of  the  Netherlands.  She 
was  only  twenty-three  years  old  when  she  was  crowned.  She 
had  to  go  specially  to  Hungary  to  be  crowned  there  with 
the  old  iron  crown  of  that  kingdom.  The  crown  had  td  be 
padded  to  make  it  fit  so  small  a  head. 

The  people  had  always  loved  Maria  Theresa.  When  she 
was  only  fourteen  she  had  begun  to  be  present  at  her  father's 
council  meetings.  People  often  got  her  to  ask  for  favours  or 
mercy  from  her  father  when  he  was  angry  with  them,  and  a 
story  is  told  that  he  once  said  to  her,  '  You  think  that  a 
sovereign  has  nothing  to  do  but  grant  favours,'  and  the  girl 
answered,  '  I  think  that  is  the  only  thing  that  can  make  a 
crown  bearable.' 

Another  story  says  that  her  father  wanted  her  to  marry 
Frederick  the  Great,  the  king  of  the  new  German  kingdom 
of  Prussia,  but  she  loved  her  cousin,  the  duke  of  Lorraine, 
and  cried  when  she  thought  she  was  not  to  be  allowed  to 
marry  him.  And  so  her  father  gave  in,  and  she  had  been 
married  four  years  when  she  became  Empress  of  Austria. 

But  before  many  months  had  passed  the  other  countries 
began  to  try  to  steal  her  lands  from  her.  France,  Spain  and 
Prussia  attacked  her,  although  both  Spain  and  Prussia  had 
promised  her  father  not  to  do  so. 

The  little  kingdom  of  Prussia  had  been  got  together  by 
Frederick's  great-grandfather,  the  elector  of  the  little  state 
of  Brandenburg.  He  was  always  called  the  'Great  Elector.' 
His  son  had  been  made  king  of  all  the  possessions  he  had  left, 

2  c 


402  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

and  the  new  kingdom  was  called  Prussia.  The  first  king  of 
Prussia  was  called  Frederick  i.  He  was  the  grandfather  of 
Frederick  ii.,  who  was  called  *  the  Great.'  Frederick  the 
Great's  father  had  been  called  Frederick  William,  like  the 
great  elector.  His  great  passion  was  the  army.  He  searched 
everywhere  for  the  tallest  men  he  could  find,  and  his  soldiers 
often  looked  like  giants. 

Fredekick  the  Great 

When  Frederick  the  Great  was  a  little  boy,  his  father  was 
dreadfully  strict  with  him.  He  was  afraid  that  the  boy 
would  not  grow  up  to  be  a  good  soldier,  because  he  liked 
playing  the  flute  and  dressing  himself  up,  and  other  things 
which  seemed  much  more  amusing  to  him  than  being  drilled 
with  the  hundred  boys  whom  his  father  brought  to  the  palace, 
so  that  '  Fritz,'  as  Frederick  was  called  in  German,  could 
learn  how  to  command  them. 

His  father  planned  out  his  whole  day  for  him.  He  was  to 
get  up  at  six,  and  not  even  turn  over  in  bed,  but  get  up  at 
once,  say  his  prayers,  wash  himself  and  have  his  breakfast 
while  his  hair  was  being  combed,  and  all  was  to  be  finished 
by  half-past  six.  Then  he  was  to  learn  history  for  two  hours, 
and  have  religious  instruction  for  another  two,  and  then  after 
another  wash  and  changing  into  a  clean  shirt  and  coat,  he 
was  to  go  in  and  see  his  father.     And  so  on. 

But  the  little  Fritz  grew  very  tired  of  all  this  strictness, 
and  as  he  grew  up  into  a  young  man  his  father  could  hardly 
bear  to  look  at  him.  He  often  beat  him,  and  once  Frederick 
ran  away,  but  he  was  brought  back,  and  put  in  a  kind  of 
prison  for  a  year.  But  later  on  the  father  and  son  began  to 
understand  each  other  better,  and  when  he  was  dying 
Frederick  William  thanked  God  for  having  given  him  such 
a  good  son  to  have  the  kingdom  after  him. 

Frederick  soon  showed  that  he  was  a  splendid  soldier  and 
a  very  clever  man.     Under  him  Prussia  grew  stronger  and 


THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY  403 

stronger,  and  it  was  all  through  the  king,  and  that  is  how  he 
came  to  be  called  Frederick  the  Great. 

Frederick  did  not  see  why  soldiers  need  be  giants,  and 
was  not  anxious,  like  his  father,  to  seize  all  the  biggest  men 
and  make  them  join  the  army ;  but  he  looked  well  after  his 
army,  and  made  it  one  of  the  best  in  Europe.  He  was  also 
a  good  ruler.  Although  he  was  absolute  like  all  the  kings  of 
the  time,  except  the  English,  he  used  his  power  well.  He 
tolerated  all  religions,  and  tried  to  do  justice  to  every- 
body. 

Frederick  became  king  in  1640,  the  same  year  that  Maria 
Theresa  became  Empress  of  Austria.  There  belonged  to 
Austria  a  province  called  Silesia,  which  the  electors  of 
Brandenburg  had  said  for  years  should  belong  to  them. 
Frederick  thought  that  this  was  his  chance  to  win  Silesia  for 
Prussia.  He  invaded  it  and  defeated  an  Austrian  army  in  a 
great  battle.  He  had  first  offered  to  help  Maria  Theresa 
against  her  other  enemies  if  she  would  give  him  the  province, 
but  she  proudly  refused.  Then  the  Elector  of  Bavaria,  who 
thought  that  he  should  be  Emperor  of  Austria,  and  had  never 
agreed  to  the  Pragmatic  Sanction,  invaded  Austria,  and  the 
duke  of  Saxony  helped  him  by  taking  an  army  into 
Bohemia. 

But  Maria  Theresa  begged  the  nobles  of  Hungary  to 
help  her.  They  were  full  of  love  and  admiration  for  their 
beautiful  young  queen,  and  declared  that  they  would  give 
their  lives  for  her.  She  in  her  turn  gave  the  Hungarians 
many  privileges  which  the  emperors  had  always  refused 
them. 

The  king  of  England  at  this  time  was  George  ii.,  who  was 
also  elector  of  the  little  German  state  of  Hanover.  Queen 
Anne  had  no  children  alive  when  she  died  in  1714,  and  the 
throne  of  England  had  been  settled  on  the  descendants  of  the 
Electress  Sophia  of  Hanover,  the  granddaughter  of  James  i. 
and  daughter  of  the  elector  who  had  been  driven  out  of  the 
Palatinate  at  the  beginning  of  the  Thirty  Years'  War.     Her 


404 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


son  George,  the  Elector  of  Hanover,  became  king  of  England 
when  Queen  Anne  died,  and  after  him  his  son  George  ii. 

Both  these  men  were  quite  German,  and  could  not  even 
speak  Enghsh.     They  did  not  even  attend  the  meeting  of  the 


THE  GREAT  NOBLES  OF  HUNGARY  TAKE  THE  OATH  OF  LOYALTY  TO  MARIA 
THERESA^  THE  YOUNG  EMPRESS  OF  AUSTRIA,  IN  1740 

(From  an  engraving  made  at  the  time). 

'  Cabinet,'  or  chief  men  in  parliament  who  ruled  the  country, 
and  this  helped  the  English  parliament  to  become  more  and 
more  powerful.  King  George  ii.  went  over  himself  to  fight 
for  Maria  Theresa.  The  Elector  of  Bavaria  had  been  crowned 
emperor,  but  he  died  in  the  middle  of  the  war,  and  Maria 
Theresa's  husband  was  crowned  emperor  and  called  Francis  i. 


THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY  405 

France  had  conquered  nearly  all  the  Netherlands,  and 
attacked  Holland,  but  when  peace  was  made  in  1748,  all 
conquered  lands  had  to  be  given  back,  except  Silesia,  which 
Frederick  kept.  Maria  Theresa  hated  giving  it  up,  but  she 
knew  there  was  nothing  else  to  do  at  the  time,  and  she  was 
always  very  sensible.  But  she  made  up  her  mind  to  take 
revenge  on  Frederick  when  the  time  came,  and  in  the  year 
1756  war  broke  out  again.  It  was  called  the  '  Seven  Years' 
War.' 

This  time  England  was  on  the  side  of  Prussia  and  France 
on  the  side  of  Austria.  But  the  greatest  help  to  Maria 
Theresa  came  from  the  Tsarina  Elizabeth  of  Russia,  the 
daughter  of  Peter  the  Great.  The  Tsarina  was  a  very 
beautiful  and  charming  woman,  though  almost  a  savage  in 
some  ways  like  her  father,  for  Russia  was  very  far  from  being 
civilized  even  yet.  Elizabeth  thought  that  Prussia  was 
getting  far  too  powerful,  and  besides  she  hated  Frederick  the 
Great,  who  could  say  very  witty  and  cruel  things,  and  had 
said  things  about  Elizabeth  which  had  been  repeated  to  her. 
Her  private  life  was  far  from  good,  but  this  did  not  make 
her  any  more  pleased  when  people  talked  about  it. 

France  and  England  fought  during  the  war  chiefly  in 
America  and  India,  and  we  must  tell  the  story  of  their 
struggle  later.  England,  which  was  growing  richer  as  her 
trade  improved,  paid  great  sums  of  money  to  help  Frederick 
to  fight.  Sometimes  the  English  grumbled,  but  William 
Pitt,  '  the  great  Commoner,'  as  he  was  called,  who  was  the 
chief  man  in  England  at  the  time,  told  them  that  it  was 
necessary,  saying  '  America  must  be  conquered  in  Germany,' 
by  which  he  meant  that  by  weakening  France  in  Europe,  he 
could  better  win  her  colonies  from  her  abroad. 

He  won  many  battles,  but  lost  many  too.  France,  Austria 
and  Russia  were  all  powerful  enemies,  but  it  was  the  cleverness 
of  Elizabeth  which  kept  them  together.  In  the  year  1762, 
Frederick  was  talking  about  '  saving  the  remains '  of  his 
possessions   for   his    nephew,   and    he    probably    meant    to 


406 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


get  himself  killed   in   battle.      But  just  then   the   Tsarina 
died. 

The  new  Tsar,  another  Peter,  was  a  great  admirer  of 
Frederick,  and  immediately  made  peace  with  him.  In  the 
next  year  a  general  peace  was  made.  In  Europe  there  was 
no  real  change   after  all  the    fighting,   but   Frederick   kept 

Silesia,  and  from  this  time 
Prussia  became  an  equal 
power  with  France  and 
Austria  among  the  countries 
of  Europe. 

When  next  we  hear  of 
the  great  powers  of  Europe 
doing  anything  important, 
we  find  Prussia,  Austria  and 
Russia  joined  together  ten 
years  afterwards,  to  steal 
land  from  the  country  of 
Poland,  which  lay  between 
their  boundaries.  None  of 
these  countries  had  any  right 
to  Poland,  but  part  of  the 
Polish  possessions,  called 
West  Prussia,  lay  on  the 
Baltic  between  Brandenburg 
and  Prussia,  and  Frederick 
longed  to  get  this  for  himself,  and  so  join  the  two  parts  of  his 
kingdom  together.  He  knew  that  he  would  not  be  able  to 
take  it  unless  Russia  and  Austria  got  some  part  of  Poland  too. 


FREDERICK    THE    GREAT    IN    OLD    AGE 

(From  a  painting  by  Chodowiecki.) 


The  Partition  of  Poland 

Poland  was  a  very  weak  country,  because  of  its  peculiar 
government.  The  king  had  very  little  power,  but  there  were 
an  immense  number  of  nobles.  Nothing  could  be  done  in 
the  government   of  the   country   unless  every  single  noble 


THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY  407 

agreed  to  it,  and  this  did  not  often  happen,  and  so  things 
were  not  done. 

But  the  Poles  were  a  proud  and  noble  people,  and  the 
three  great  powers  who  now  attacked  them  were  doing  a 
very  cruel  and  selfish  thing.  There  was  a  great  deal  of 
trouble  going  on  in  Poland  when  the  three  countries  attacked 
it.  Prussia  got  West  Prussia,  Russia  a  slice  of  the  East  of 
Poland,  and  Austria  a  province  in  the  South. 

Maria  Theresa  did  not  much  like  the  idea  of  the 
*  partition '  of  Poland  as  it  was  called,  but  she  thought  that 
it  was  her  duty  to  Austria  to  take  part,  if  Prussia  and  Russia 
did  so,  and,  she  said,  if  she  took  any  she  must  have  a  good 
share. 

The  Polish  nobles  were  treated  very  cruelly  when  they 
refused  to  agree  to  the  partition,  and  had  to  give  in.  The 
ruler  of  Russia  at  this  time  was  the  great  Tsarina, 
Catherine  ii.  She  was  the  wife  of  the  Peter  who  admired 
Frederick  the  Great  so  much.  This  Peter  was  really  a  very 
mean  and  miserable  little  man.  He  was  more  German  than 
Russian,  and  often  hurt  the  feelings  of  the  people  whom  he 
pretended  to  govern.  He  was  very  rough  and  cruel  to  his 
wife. 

Catherine  was  not  a  good  woman,  but  she  was  a  splendid 
empress.  Although  she  was  a  German  Protestant  princess, 
she  soon  learned  the  Russian  language  and  took  the  religion 
of  the  Greek  Church,  which  the  Russians  followed,  as  her 
own.  After  a  time  she  got  some  of  the  chief  Russians  to 
seize  Peter  and  put  him  in  prison,  where  he  died.  Most 
people  think  that  Catherine  had  him  murdered.  But  the 
Russians  were  proud  of  their  Tsarina,  and  she  did  all  she 
could  to  make  the  country  greater. 

For  twenty  years  after  the  first  partition  of  Poland,  that 
part  of  the  country  which  was  left  was  very  much  under  the 
power  of  Catherine.  At  last,  while  she  was  fighting  the 
Turks,  some  of  the  Poles  tried  to  make  a  new  government 
which  would  make  their  country  freer.     But  Catherine  soon 


408  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

stopped  this.  In  1793  there  was  a  second  partition  of  Poland 
between  Prussia  and  Russia.  Frederick  the  Great  and 
Maria  Theresa  were  both  dead  by  this  time,  but  the  later 
rulers  of  those  countries  were  just  as  cruel  to  Poland. 

After  this  there  was  only  a  tiny  kingdom  of  Poland  left. 
A  brave  noble  called  Kosciusko  tried  to  get  help  for  his 
country  from  France  and  other  countries,  but  could  not,  and 
then  he  and  a  few  brave  friends  died  fighting  against  their 
enemies.  Then  a  third  partition  was  made  of  all  that  was 
left  of  Poland.  Since  then  there  has  never  really  been  a 
kingdom  of  Poland,  but  Polish  exiles  may  be  found  in  every 
country  of  Europe.  The  best  of  them  are  always  hoping  for 
the  time  when  Poland  shall  be  a  nation  once  more.  The 
story  of  the  partitions  of  Poland  show  almost  better  than  any- 
thing else  the  selfishness  of  the  kings  and  queens  of  Europe 
in  the  eighteenth  century. 


CHAPTER  XXXIX 

THE  STORY  OF  INDIA 

During  the  Seven  Years'  War  in  Europe,  England  won 
all  India  for  her  own.  India  is  a  great  peninsula  in  the  south 
of  Asia,  and  almost  a  continent  in  itself  as  far  as  size  goes. 
It  is  separated  from  Asia  by  a  chain  of  mountains  in  which 
are  some  of  the  highest  peaks  in  the  world.  All  through  the 
days  of  Greece  and  Rome  and  the  Middle  Ages,  people  did 
not  know  much  about  India.  It  had  a  separate  life  of  its  own. 
We  have  seen  how,  about  the  time  when  the  Jews  were 
wandering  west  from  Mesopotamia  to  find  a  home  in  the  land 
of  Canaan,  a  branch  of  the  Aryan  people,  to  which  the  Persians 
and  Greeks  and  Romans  and  the  English  all  belonged,  was 
pouring  into  India.  There  were  already  people  in  India  of 
another  race,  darker  still  than  the  brown-skinned  branch  of 
the  Aryan  people  which  now  came  in  and  conquered  them. 

The  Dravidians,  as  these  people  were  called,  were  easily 
conquered  by  the  Aryans,  and  soon  there  were  far  more 
Aryan's  in  the  north.  But  in  the  high  tableland  in  the 
south  of  India,  called  the  Deccan,  there  were  always  more 
Dravidians  than  Aryans,  and  still  to-day  the  people  of  that 
part  of  India  and  of  the  Island  of  Ceylon  to  the  south  of 
India  belong  chiefly  to  this  people,  who  are  rather  like  the 
negroes  of  Africa. 

The  Dravidians  were  quite  savage  people  and  not  very 
intelligent.  They  believed  in  wicked  spirits  and  demons,  and 
prayed  to  them.  The  Aryans  made  slaves  of  the  Dravidians. 
They  themselves  were  divided  into  three  classes  or  '  castes.' 
There  were  the  priests  or  Brahmans,  who  really  governed  the 


410  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

others,  the  soldiers,  and  the  ordinary  people.  The  people 
of  one  *  caste  '  could  not  marry  with  those  of  another.  Not 
even  the  working-class  would  marry  with  the  conquered 
Dravidians.  There  were  divisions  again  in  each  caste,  and 
often  the  people  of  one  division  could  not  marry  or  even  eat 
with  the  people  of  another.  This  caste  system,  as  it  is  called, 
still  goes  on  in  India  to-day. 

Alexander  the  Great,  as  we  know,  led  an  army  into  India 
and  won  some  battles,  but  he  never  made  any  real  conquest. 
After  this,  no  outside  people  troubled  India  for  many  years. 
Sometimes,  in  the  seventh  and  eighth  centuries,  when  the 
followers  of  Mohammed  were  conquering  West  Asia,  North 
Africa,  and  Spain,  a  few  Arabs  would  cross  the  Himalayas, 
but  there  was  never  any  real  conquest  until  in  the  year  1004 
A.D.  a  Mohammedan  leader  from  a  place  called  Ghuzni,  in 
the  country  which  is  now  called  Afghanistan,  to  the  north- 
west of  India,  took  a  great  army  and  conquered  the  Punjab, 
as  the  land  round  the  great  river  Indus  and  its  tributaries  is 
called. 

After  this  there  were  many  Mohammedan  invasions  and 
conquests,  lasting  for  over  five  hundred  years,  right  through 
the  Middle  Ages.  In  this  way  a  new  people  and  the 
Mohammedan  religion  found  their  way  into  India.  This  is 
why  to-day,  among  all  the  different  peoples  of  India,  so  many 
Mohammedans  are  to  be  found,  even  more  than  there  are 
Hindus,  who  keep  to  their  old  religion  of  the  Brahmans. 

In  the  early  part  of  the  sixteenth  century  a  new  people 
swarmed  into  India,  a  great  band  of  Mongolians  from  the 
centre  of  Asia,  and  their  leader  made  himself  ruler  of  all 
India.  He  was  called  the  Great  Mogul,  and  had  his  capital 
at  Delhi.  The  grandson  of  this  first  Mongolian  conqueror 
who  ruled  when  his  time  came  was  called  Akbar.  He  was  a 
very  fine  soldier  and  a  splendid  ruler.  The  country  was 
happy  and  peaceful  under  him.  He  died  two  years  after 
Queen  Elizabeth,  and  it  is  strange  to  think  that  while  in  the 
countries  of  Europe,  Protestants  and  Catholics  were  being 


THE    GREAT    EMPEROR    AKBAR    ENTERS    HIS    CITY    IN    STATE. 
(From  an  ancient  Indian  manuscript  in  the  Victoria  and  Albert  Ivluseum. 


OtORGf  PHILIPS.  SON  LTD 


'M[  ICNDOU  SJOOSAF'UlLAl    INSflfUTl 


INDIA 


412  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

so  dreadfully  persecuted  for  their  religion,  this  great  Eastern 
ruler  had  given  toleration  to  Hindus  and  Mohammedans 
equally. 

The  rulers  who  came  after  him  seemed  almost  more 
splendid,  but  they  were  very  different.  They  were  cruel, 
like  so  many  Eastern  kings  and  emperors,  and  thought 
very  little  of  murdering  any  one  who  offended  them.  The 
greatest  of  all  for  the  magnificence  of  his  court  was  the 
Great  Mogul  Aurangzib.  He  had  stolen  the  throne  from 
his  father,  whom  he  put  into  prison.  To  make  himself 
safer,  he  then  murdered  his  own  three  brothers.  The  palace 
of  the  Great  Mogul  at  Delhi  was  one  of  the  wonders  of 
the  world.  Before  its  gates  stood  two  great  elephants  carved 
out  of  stone,  with  immense  statues  of  soldiers  on  their  backs. 

The  great  hall  of  the  palace,  where  the  'Durbar'  or 
Council  met,  had  a  roof  of  pure  white  marble  held  up  by 
thirty  columns  also  of  marble.  The  Great  Mogul  had  seven 
magnificent  thrones  covered  with  different  precious  stones — 
one  with  pearls,  another  with  rubies,  another  with  diamonds, 
and  so  on.  But  all  this  splendour  could  not  make  Aurangzib 
happy.  In  his  last  years  he  was  full  of  fear  lest  some  one 
should  murder  him,  as  he  had  murdered  so  many.  Soon  after 
his  death  his  great  empire  broke  up  into  many  little  states. 
Most  of  the  rulers  pretended  to  obey  the  Great  Mogul  at 
Delhi,  but  they  were  really  independent.  Where  there  were 
so  many  races  and  so  many  divisions,  it  would  be  easy  for  a 
strong  power  to  come  and  conquer,  and  that  is  what  happened. 

We  saw  how  the  Portuguese,  who  were  the  first  Europeans 
to  sail  to  India,  set  up  a  place  at  Goa,  where  they  could 
exchange  the  things  they  brought  from  Europe  for  the  spices 
which  they  carried  back  from  India.  The  Portuguese  said 
that  they  alone  of  all  the  people  of  Europe  had  the  right  to 
trade  with  India,  but  it  was  not  long  before  the  Dutch  ships 
began  to  trade  with  the  towns  on  the  east  coast  of  India. 
In  time  France  and  England  both  set  up  trading  stations  in 
India  too.      The  chief  English   stations  were  Calcutta  and 


THE  STORY  OF  INDIA  413 

Madras  on  the  east  coast,  and  Bombay  on  the  west.  The 
chief  French  trading-station  was  Pondicherry,  south  of 
Madras. 

The  English  and  French  each  paid  some  money  every 
year  to  one  of  the  native  princes  for  permission  to  trade. 
The  Frenchman  Dupleix,  who  was  in  charge  of  Pondicherry, 
was  the  first  to  have  the  idea  of  how  easy  it  would  be  for  a 
strong  European  people  to  win  this  great  country  for  them- 
selves. He  thought  that  if  only  the  English  could  be  driven 
from  India,  France  could  win  this  wonderful  prize.  The  two 
countries  were  on  opposite  sides  in  the  War  of  the  Austrian 
Succession,  and  Dupleix  made  this  an  excuse  for  attacking  the 
English  in  Madras.  An  English  fleet  was  quite  near,  but 
was  met  by  a  small  French  fleet  under  another  Frenchman 
called  La  Bourdonnais.  The  fleets  fought,  and  though 
neither  won,  the  English  sailed  away,  and  so  Dupleix,  with  the 
help  of  La  Bourdonnais,  was  able  to  take  Madras,  where  there 
were  very  few  men. 

Most  of  the  English  were  carried  off  to  Pondicherry,  but 
some  escaped  to  another  little  station  which  the  English 
held  a  few  miles  south  of  Madras.  Dupleix  attacked  this 
station,  which  was  called  Fort  St.  David,  but  the  little  band 
of  Englishmen  held  it  bravely,  and  it  was  still  unconquered 
when  peace  was  made  between  France  and  England  at  the 
end  of  the  War  of  the  Austrian  Succession.  Dupleix  was 
ordered  to  give  Madras  back  to  the  English,  and  did  so  very 
unwillingly.  The  Englishmen  at  the  trading-stations  in  India 
were  working  for  the  East  India  Company,  which  had  been 
given  the  rights  of  all  trade  with  India  by  Queen  Elizabeth. 

Among  the  clerks  in  the  Company's  service  at  Madras  was 
a  young  man  called  Robert  Clive.  He  had  been  the 
naughty  boy  of  the  family  among  his  brothers  and  sisters 
in  his  English  home.  He  was  very  passionate  and  very 
mischievous  when  he  was  a  little  boy.  Once  he  climbed  to 
the  top  of  a  very  high  steeple,  and  every  one  who  saw  him 
was  terrified,  but  he  got  down  safely  after  all.     He  went  to 


414  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

many  schools  but  never  learned  very  much.  When  he  was 
eighteen  he  was  sent  out  to  India.  He  hated  being  a  clerk, 
and  felt  very  lonely  and  sad.  Twice  he  tried  to  shoot  him- 
self but  did  not  shoot  straight,  and  then  he  made  up  his 
mind  that  he  must  be  meant  for  something  great.  He  was 
one  of  the  men  who  escaped  to  Fort  St.  David  from  Madras. 
At  last  he  had  found  something  that  he  really  liked  to  do, 
and  when  he  went  back  to  Madras  he  got  the  Company  to 
have  him  as  a  soldier  instead  of  a  clerk. 

There  was  not  peace  for  very  long  between  the  English 
and  French  in  India.  They  now  hated  each  other  bitterly. 
Their  countries  were  at  peace  until  the  Seven  Years'  War 
broke  out  in  1756,  but  long  before  this  there  was  fighting 
again  in  India.  The  way  in  which  the  French  and  English 
found  excuses  for  fighting  was  to  take  part  in  quarrels  between 
the  native  princes  of  the  States  in  the  Deccan  which  broke 
out  at  this  time. 

There  were  struggles  about  the  crowns  of  the  Deccan 
and  of  the  Carnatic,  a  province  in  the  Deccan.  The  French 
took  one  side  and  the  English  the  other.  The  princes 
whom  the  French  were  helping  were  successful  at  first, 
and  great  honour  was  done  to  Dupleix.  He  was  dressed 
in  beautiful  Mohammedan  robes,  and  a  monument  was  put 
up  with  the  story  of  his  greatness  in  four  languages.  The 
natives,  who  had  before  despised  the  white  men,  had  begun 
to  see  how  powerful  they  really  were.  In  a  fight  which  had 
broken  out  between  the  French  and  a  native  prince,  Dupleix 
with  a  few  French  soldiers  had  defeated  a  large  army  of 
natives. 

The  Hindus  had  no  idea  of  training  their  soldiers,  but 
both  French  and  Enghsh  had  found  out  by  this  time  that 
the  native  soldiers  were  almost  as  good  as  white  soldiers. 
The  natives  who  were  trained  in  this  way  were  called 
*  Sepoys.'  When  the  English  in  Madras  saw  how  Dupleix 
and  his  friends  were  succeeding,  they  sent  soldiers  to  help 
the   town   of  Trichinopoli,  where  the  native   prince    called 


THE  STORY  OF  INDIA  415 

Mohammed   Ali,  whose   side  they  were   taking  against  the 
French,  was  being  besieged. 

Among  the  soldiers  sent  to  Trichinopoli  was  Clive,  but 
he  saw  that  not  much  good  could  be  done  there,  so  he 
went  back  to  Madras  and  asked  the  Governor  to  give  him 
soldiers  to  attack  Arcot,  the  capital  of  the  Carnatic. 
Natives  were  watching  Clive  with  his  two  hundred  English 
soldiers  and  his  three  hundred  Sepoys  as  he  marched  along 
the  sixty-five  miles  to  Arcot.  A  great  storm  came  on, 
but  Glive  took  no  notice  of  the  thunder  and  lightning 
and  marched  steadily  on.  This  seemed  wonderful  to  the 
natives,  and  they  sent  messengers  on  to  Arcot  to  tell  the 
natives  there  what  a  brave  enemy  was  coming  against  them. 
The  people  of  Arcot  were  so  frightened  that  they  fled  away, 
and  Clive  took  the  empty  town  without  any  fighting  at  all. 

But  soon  soldiers  were  sent  from  Trichinopoli  to  attack 
them.  Clive  and  his  men  fought  them  for  weeks.  The 
Sepoys  as  well  as  the  white  soldiers  loved  and  admired  him. 
The  Sepoys  did  a  very  fine  thing.  There  was  not  much  to 
eat  except  a  little  rice,  and  they  said  that  the  white  soldiers 
must  have  all  the  rice,  while  they  could  manage  quite  well 
with  the  water  in  which  it  was  boiled.  At  last  one  day  the 
enemy  made  one  last  great  attack.  In  the  front  of  the  army 
were  great  elephants  with  iron  weapons  on  their  heads  to 
batter  down  the  gates  of  the  town.  But  when  the  English 
fired  on  them  the  elephants  turned  and  fled,  treading  down 
and  crushing  the  men  of  their  own  army.  In  an  hour  the 
enemy  had  fled  and  the  great  siege  of  Arcot  was  over. 

Clive  won  many  victories  after  this,  and  soon  the  English 
were  as  powerful  in  the  Carnatic  as  the  French  had  been. 
Dupleix  was  a  great  statesman  but  not  a  great  soldier.  He 
had  had  no  help  from  France,  and  in  a  year  or  two  he  was 
called  home  in  disgrace.  He  died  broken-hearted  at  the 
thought  of  the  empire  he  had  tried  to  win  for  France,  and 
which  had  been  taken  instead  by  the  English.  Meanwhile 
Clive  had  gone  back  to  England  for  a  rest,  and  had  been 


416 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


praised  and  honoured  by  every  one.  On  the  day  he  landed 
again  in  India  a  very  dreadful  thing  had  happened,  though 
Clive  did  not  hear  of  it  at  once. 


The  Black  Hole  of  Calcutta 

In  Calcutta  so  far  all  had  been  peaceful.  The  English 
were  quite  friendly  with  the  ruler  or  Nawab  of  Bengal,  but  in 
1756  he  died,  and  a  young  man  called  Siraj- 
ud-Daula  became  Nawab.  He  was  really  half 
mad  and  dreadfully  cruel,  very  much  like  the 
Emperor  Nero  in  character.  He  had  an  idea 
that  there  were  great  treasures  shut  up  in  the 
fort  at  Calcutta,  and  made  up  his  mind  to  get 
them.  He  quarrelled  with  the  English  and 
then  attacked  the  fort.  The  women  and 
children  were  put  safely  on  ships  in  the  river, 
all  but  one  lady,  who  would  not  leave  her 
husband,  but  the  fort  was  taken  and  two 
hundred  men  in  it. 

The  Nawab  ordered  that  one  hundred  and 
forty-six  of  them  should  be  shut  up  in  a  small 
room  with  only  two  tiny  windows.  It  was 
Black  Hole  of  Calcutta.'  The 
night  was  terribly  hot,  and  soon  the  poor 
prisoners  were  crying  for  air  and  water, 
but  the  native  soldiers  at  first  only  laughed 
and  held  torches  to  the  windows  so  that  they  could  see  the 
people  struggling  inside,  for  they  were  half  mad  by  this 
time.  At  last  they  brought  some  skin  bottles  of  water, 
but  they  were  too  big  to  pass  between  the  bars.  Some  was 
poured  in  and  a  few  drops  caught,  but  the  fighting  and 
shrieking  grew  worse  than  ever,  until  the  sound  died  down 
to  a  moan.  In  the  morning  twenty-three  people  crawled 
out  when  the  door  was  opened.  The  lady  who  would  not 
leave  her  husband  was  among  them,  but  he  was  dead  inside. 


SIRAJ-UD-DAULA 

The  Nawab  who  shut 

up  one   hundred   and    Callcd     the 

forty-six  people  in  the 
Black    Hole    of    Cal- 
cutta. (From  an  Indian 
painting). 


THE  STORY  OF  INDIA  417 

When  the  story  of  this  terrible  night  reached  the  other 
Enghsh  in  India,  CHve  set  out  at  once  with  an  army  of 
EngHshmen  and  Sepoys  as  before,  and  sailed  to  Calcutta.  He 
easily  conquered  the  Nawab  and  got  Calcutta  back.  Siraj-ud- 
Daula  made  many  promises,  and  Clive  did  not  punish  him 
further,  but  soon  he  found  out  that  the  Nawab  was  trying  to 
get  help  from  a  French  fort  near  against  the  English.  So 
Cliye  besieged  the  fort  and  took  it.  So  ended  French  power 
in  the  north  of  India. 

Then  Clive  went  against  the  Nawab,  who  had  an 
enormous  army  at  Plassey,  ninety-six  miles  to  the  north  of 
Calcutta.  Here  he  won  the  famous  battle  of  Plassey  with 
three  thousand  men  against  nearly  sixty  thousand.  Clive 
made  Mir  Jaffa,  Siraj-ud-Daula's  general,  ruler  of  Bengal, 
but  he  had  to  pay  a  great  deal  of  money  to  the  English. 
It  was  not  long  before  he  murdered  his  old  master,  and  so 
revenged  the  English  for  the  terrible  tragedy  of  the  Black 
Hole  of  Calcutta. 

The  battle  of  Plassey  was  won  in  1757,  and  William  Pitt, 
who  was  choosing  the  men  and  arranging  for  the  struggle 
with  France  in  Europe  and  America,  said  that  Clive  was  a 
'  heaven-born  general.'  Three  years  later  another  English 
commander.  Eyre  Coote,  defeated  the  French  in  the  south  of 
India  at  the  battle  of  Wandewash.  After  this  France  had 
no  further  chance  in  India. 

But  even  the  best  Englishmen  were  inclined  to  think  of 
India  as  a  place  from  which  to  get  money  to  send  home  to 
England.  The  Englishmen  in  the  service  of  the  East  India 
Company  were  very  badly  paid,  and  so,  although  they  were 
forbidden  to  trade  for  themselves,  they  did  so.  They  were 
very  unjust  to  the  natives,  and  soon  there  was  a  great  deal 
of  misery  in  India.  There  was  another  massacre  at  Patna 
as  bad  as  that  of  the  Black  Hole.  This  was  while  Clive 
was  away  in  England.  He  went  back  and  tried  to  put 
things  in  order  and  give  more  justice  to  the  natives.  But 
even  Clive  had  done  some  things  which  seemed  very  unjust 

2d 


418 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


to  the  Englisli  at  home  when  they  heard  of  them,  for  they 
did  not  know  how  difficult  things  were  in  India,  and  how 
hard  it  was  to  be  sure  that  the  native  princes  would  keep 
their  promises. 

So  when  Clive  got  back  to  England  again  he  had  to 
defend  himself  in  Parliament  against  people  who  said  he  had 
behaved  wickedly  in  India.  In  the  end  Parliament  declared 
*  that  Robert,  Lord  Clive,  did  render  great  and  meritorious 

services  to  his  country.'  But 
Clive  had  been  dreadfully  upset. 
His  old  sadness  came  on  him 
again,  and  one  day  he  was  found 
dead.     He  had  killed  himself. 

Still  things  were  very  bad  in 
India.  The  native  princes  had  no 
longer  any  power.  The  English- 
men paid  large  sums  of  money  to 
them,  and  they  had  to  be  content 
with  that.  All  the  taxes  collected 
from  the  people  were  now  paid  to 
the  East  India  Company,  but  the 
Englishmen  did  not  really  under- 
stand what  was  going  on,  and  the 
native  collectors  took  much  more 
from  the  people  than  they  should  have  done,  and  kept  a  great 
deal  of  the  money  for  themselves.  The  people  grew  poorer 
and  poorer.  Then  there  was  a  great  famine.  The  people 
were  starving  and  became  as  thin  as  skeletons.  Thousands 
died,  and  their  bodies  lay  unburied  and  then  plague  broke 
out. 

At  last  Warren  Hastings,  who  was  in  the  service  of  the 
East  India  Company  and  had  fought  in  the  battle  of  Plassey, 
was  sent  out  as  Governor.  He  was,  like  Dupleix,  a  statesman 
more  than  a  soldier,  and  he  did  all  he  could  to  make  things 
better.  But  even  then  things  were  still  very  bad.  Much 
trouble    came   through    the  English   not  understanding   the 


ROBERT    CLIVE,    THE    SAVIOUR    OF 
INDIA 

(From  a  painting  by  Gainsborough). 


THE  STORY  OF  INDIA  419 

customs  of  the  Hindus.  Once  a  man  who  had  cheated  the 
English  very  badly  was  put  to  death.  In  those  days  stealing 
or  cheating  was  still  punished  by  death  even  in  England. 
But  this  man  was  a  Brahman,  and  to  the  natives  it  seemed 
a  terrible  thing  that  one  of  the  priestly  caste  should  be 
killed. 

At  last  people  in  England  began  to  think  that  the  East 
India  Company  should  not  have  the  government  of  India, 
and  a  president  was  sent  out  to  rule  India  for  the  government 
at  home.  In  the  year  1788  an  attack  was  made  on  Warren 
Hastings,  and  he  was  tried  before  Parliament  for  misrule 
in  India.  Edmund  Burke,  a  famous  Irish  member  of  Parlia- 
ment and  a  splendid  speaker,  began  with  a  speech  in  which 
he  described  the  terrible  sufferings  of  the  natives  and  the 
awful  behaviour  of  Hastings.  People  wept  while  Burke 
spoke,  and  there  was  a  terrible  feeling  against  Hastings,  but 
as  time  went  on  people  began  to  understand  the  truth  of  the 
case,  and  at  the  end  of  seven  years  Hastings  was  declared 
'  Not  guilty.'  He  lived  a  happy  cheerful  life  in  his  English 
country  home  until  he  died  when  he  was  eighty-seven  years 
old. 

As  time  went  on  England  got  power  over  all  the  native 
princes  of  India.  Many  of  them  made  treaties  with  the 
English  by  which  their  soldiers  were  put  under  British 
officers  and  were  paid  by  the  English.  At  the  same  time, 
they  generally  gave  up  some  of  their  land  altogether  to  the 
English. 

The  Indian  Mutiny 

In  the  year  1857  there  was  a  terrible  rebellion  of  the 
native  soldiers  all  over  the  north  of  India. 

It  was  partly  a  religious  movement.  Some  new  guns 
were  being  used,  and  the  cartridges  fired  from  them  were 
greased  with  fat.  The  end  of  the  cartridge  had  to  be 
bitten  off  by  the  soldiers.  Now  the  Hindus  and  the 
Mohammedans   were   forbidden  by  their   religions  to  touch 


420  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

the  fat  of  cows  or  pigs.  It  was  now  said  that  the  cartridges 
were  greased  with  the  fat  of  these  animals.  The  soldiers 
were  told  that  this  was  not  true,  but  they  would  not  believe 
the  English.  At  last  they  were  told  that  the  greased 
cartridges  would  not  be  used  any  more.  But  then  they 
began  to  think  that  the  shiny  paper  in  which  other  cartridges 
were  wrapped  was  also  polished  by  the  same  grease  and  a 
rebellion  broke  out. 

All  over  the  north  of  India  the  native  soldiers  attacked 
the  English — men,  women,  and  children.  There  was  a 
terrible  massacre  at  Cawnpore,  and  Lucknow  was  only 
saved  after  a  terrible  siege.  The  English  had  been  taken 
completely  by  surprise,  but  the  rebellion  was  soon  put  down. 
There  were  not  many  English  soldiers,  but  many  of  the 
natives  remained  faithful,  and  when  they  took  the  Sepoys 
prisoners  it  would  not  have  been  easy  to  carry  them  with 
them.  The  English  were  dreadfully  angry,  too,  at  the 
thought  of  their  women  and  children,  and  were  not  sorry 
to  kill  their  prisoners. 

After  the  Mutiny  it  was  thought  better  that  India  should 
be  taken  altogether  from  the  East  India  Company,  and  so 
that  company  came  to  an  end  at  last.  Since  then  India  has 
been  ruled  by  a  Viceroy  or  representative  of  the  King  or 
Queen  of  England.  England  now  owns  two-thirds  of  all  the 
land  of  India,  and  the  other  third  is  ruled  by  native  princes 
under  her.     The  king  is  called  Emperor  of  India. 

In  India  the  English  people  have  done  very  wonderful 
things,  which  the  natives  could  never  have  done  for  them- 
selves. Railways,  roads,  and  bridges  have  been  built,  and  it 
is  now  easy  to  get  from  one  part  of  India  to  another.  In 
old  days,  when  a  time  of  dry  weather  came,  the  land  was 
burned  up,  and  there  was  famine,  but  the  Enghsh  have  made 
canals  in  which  water  which  has  been  stored  up  can  be 
carried  to  the  fields  in  dry  weather. 

The  population  of  India  grows  very  quickly,  almost  too 
quickly,  for  it  sometimes   seems  that  the  land  could  never 


THE  STORY  OF  INDIA  421 

give  food  for  all,  but  now  the  English  have  set  up  factories, 
and  many  of  the  people  leave  the  country  parts  and  work 
in  the  towns.  Bombay  is  famous  for  its  manufacture  of 
colour-stuffs  and  muslin.  Some  people  are  even  afraid  that 
the  cotton  goods  made  in  India  will  take  the  place  of  those 
made  in  Manchester  and  the  great  towns  of  Lancashire,  and 
that  the  cotton  trade  of  that  county  will  be  ruined.  These 
cotton  goods,  and  Indian  tea  and  wheat,  are  bought  by  the 
countries  of  Europe. 

Many  of  the  higher  class  of  natives  come  now  to  be 
educated  in  England,  and  some  of  these  young  students  think 
that  India  should  be  governed  by  its  own  people.  The  Eng- 
lish are  allowing  some  of  the  educated  people  to  help  in  the 
government  of  their  country,  but  though  it  may  seem  strange 
that  a  little  country  like  England  should  govern  a  continent 
like  India  with  its  millions  and  millions  of  people,  it  must  be 
remembered  that  these  people  of  India  are  of  many  different 
races,  that  they  do  not  seem  able  to  join  together  in  any  way, 
and  that  if  England  or  some  other  European  country  had 
not  interfered  there  might  have  been  fighting  and  misery  for 
centuries  yet. 

On  the  whole,  the  people  of  India  and  the  native  princes 
honour  and  respect  Great  Britain,  and  when  King  George 
and  Queen  Mary  paid  a  visit  to  India  in  the  year  1912,  there 
w^as  a  great  gathering  of  princes  at  the  Durbar  to  do  them 
honour. 


CHAPTER    XL 

THE  STORY  OF  CANADA 

To  many  men  from  the  earliest  times  there  has  come  a 
strange  longing  which  they  cannot  put  aside.  It  is  a  longing 
to  go  out  and  travel  to  the  unknown  parts  of  the  world,  to 
see  what  they  are  like,  what  people  live  there,  what  these 
people  do,  and  what  things  grow  there.  It  was  this  longing 
which  drove  Columbus  across  the  ocean  to  discover  America. 

But  Columbus  was  not  really  the  first  to  find  America. 
The  Northmen,  whose  land  is  Norway  and  Sweden,  had 
ever  loved  adventure,  as  they  do  still.  In  the  last  few  years 
men  from  Norway  have  sailed  right  out  many  times  to  the 
frozen  North  and  to  the  centre  of  the  snowy  South,  which  we 
call  the  South  Pole.  It  was  when  Ethelred  the  Unready 
was  ruling  in  England  in  the  eleventh  century  that  Lief 
Ericson  sailed  off  towards  the  west,  just  when  some  of  the 
other  Northmen  were  swooping  down  upon  England.  After 
many  days  he  and  his  fellow-sailors  came  to  a  land  which 
was  probably  that  which  we  now  call  Canada,  the  northern 
part  of  North  America.  But  the  Northmen  sailed  back  to 
their  own  country,  and  it  was  nearly  five  hundred  years  before 
any  one  from  Europe  visited  Canada  again. 

This  time  it  was  an  Englishman,  John  Cabot,  who  set  sail 
from  Bristol  and  came  to  Canada.  Again  it  was  only  a  visit, 
and  the  Englishman  did  not  try  to  settle  there.  But  fisher- 
men learned  soon  that  good  fishing  was  to  be  had  near  the 
new  country,  and  they  commenced  to  sail  and  fish  round  the 
island  of  Newfoundland  and  the  coasts  of  North  America. 

Just  thirty-seven  years  after  Cabot's  voyage,  in  1534,  a 


-  W.OSCE  fMlUPlSONlTO 


E  LOWDON  GEOGRAPHICAL  INSTIIUTE 


NORTH    AMERICA 


424 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


French  sailor  was  sent  by  King  Francis  i.  to  see  what  he 
could  find.  Jacques  Cartier,  as  he  was  called,  was  even 
more  venturesome  than  Cabot.  He  sailed  up  the  Gulf  of 
St.  Lawrence  to  the  place  where  Montreal  now  stands,  and  it 
is  to  him  that  we  owe  the  name  '  Canada.'  For  it  is  said 
that  when  he  met  with  some  Red  Indians  who  lived  in  the 
land  in  those  days,  they  pointed  to  their  huts  saying 
*  Cannata,'  meaning  to  point  out  their  village  to  him.  In 
their  language  the  word  '  Cannata '  means  '  village,'  but  Cartier 
thought  they  were  telling  him  the  name  of  the  land,  and  so 
'  Cannata '  or  '  Canada '  he  called  it. 


The  First  Colonist  in  Canada 

No  one  from  Europe,  so  far,  had  attempted  to  stay  in 
Canada,  for  Cartier  sailed  back  again  like  Cabot,  and  it  was 

almost  seventy  years 
before  the  next  visitors 
came  to  the  country  and 
began  to  build  them- 
selves houses.  Samuel 
de  Champlain,  who  was 
the  leader  this  time,  is 
the  first  great  name  in 
the  story  of  Canada. 
He  will  always  be  re- 
membered through  the 
beautiful  lake  Champ- 
lain,  which  he  dis- 
covered, and  which 
was  called  after  him. 
Champlain  was  a  very 
wise  and  brave  man,  and  when  he  arrived  in  Canada  in  the 
year  1603  he  at  once  made  friends  with  the  Indians.  He 
had  made  his  plans  and  intended  to  stay  in  Canada,  for  he 
had  been  sent  out  by  a  man  to  whom  the  French  king  had 


THE    FIRST    SETTLEMENT    IN    QUEBEC 

(From  a  drawing  in  Champlain's  account  of  his  travels, 
published  in  1613). 


THE  STORY  OF  CANADA  425 

given  the  right  to  be  the  only  one  allowed  to  trade  with 
Canada  and  sell  the  furs  which  were  got  from  the  wild  animals 
there.  The  first  thing  to  do  was  to  find  a  place  where  he 
could  live  ;  and  so  Champlain  sailed  up  the  river  St.  Lawrence 
and  round  the  coast  until  he  made  up  his  mind  to  settle  at 
Port  Royal,  now  called  Annapolis,  in  Nova  Scotia. 

Champlain  had  soon  to  go  back  to  France,  but  he  went 
back  again  to  Canada,  and  this  time  founded  the  city  of 
Quebec  in  1608.  He  had  made  friends  with  the  Huron 
Indians,  but  had  to  fight  with  the  fierce  tribe  called  the 
Iroquois. 

Champlain  was  a  Catholic  and  a  very  religious  man.  He 
did  not  mind  much  about  the  fur-trader  or  founding  towns 
and  settlements.  What  he  did  care  for  was  ever  to  find  new 
places  and  to  bring  his  religion  to  the  people  whom  he  met. 
He  commenced  a  settlement  at  Montreal,  and  thinking  to 
find  a  new  way  to  China,  sailed  up  the  Ottawa  river.  But 
the  settlements  he  made  were  not  well  protected,  and  about 
the  time  he  founded  Montreal  the  English  from  Virginia  took 
Port  Royal,  and  in  1629  an  English  fleet  took  Quebec. 
Champlain  was  taken  prisoner  to  England,  but  four  years 
later  Canada  was  given  back  to  the  French  and  he  returned 
to  Quebec,  where  he  died  in  1635. 

Struggles  with  the  Indians 

Champlain's  work  was  not  carried  out  without  much  fight- 
ing with  the  savage  and  treacherous  Red  Indians,  and  the 
warfare  went  on  for  many  years  longer.  It  was  not  a  life  to 
persuade  many  people  to  leave  their  homes  in  France,  but 
many  people  did  go.  There  were  the  missionaries,  'black 
robes,'  as  the  Indians  called  these  priests,  who  were  the 
bravest  colonists  of  all.  They  thought  it  was  their  duty  to 
go  out  and  tell  the  Indians  about  God,  Yet,  thirty  years 
after  Champlain's  death,  there  were  only  about  two  thousand 
Frenchmen   in   Canada.     Some  of  these  pushed  their  way 


426  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

through  the  thick  forests  without  paths,  against  wild  beasts 
and  savage  men  to  the  great  Lake  Superior,  and  south  to 
where  the  great  river  Mississippi  enters  the  ocean,  and  founded 
a  colony  which  they  called  '  Louisiana  '  after  their  King  Louis. 

Some  of  the  priests  in  Canada  thought  that  the  Indians 
were  being  made  wilder  and  fiercer  through  the  white  man 
giving  them  brandy  and  other  spirits  to  drink,  and  they  tried 
to  prevent  it,  but  did  not  succeed  very  well. 

One  night  in  the  August  of  the  year  1689,  the  Iroquois 
took  a  terrible  revenge  on  the  French.  It  was  a  dark  and 
stormy  night,  and  the  people  in  a  small  village  near  Montreal 
had  gone  to  bed,  when  suddenly  there  burst  in  upon  them  a 
large  number  of  Indians.  Two  hundred  of  the  colonists  were 
killed  at  once  by  one  thousand  five  hundred  Iroquois.  And 
they  were  indeed  happier  than  those  who  were  left.  For  a 
hundred  of  these  were  carried  off  and  tortured  in  the  most 
horrible  ways  before  they  were  killed. 

At  this  time  a  brave  Frenchman  called  Louis  de  Buade 
had  been  sent  back  to  France  ;  but  when  he  returned  he 
fought  against  the  Iroquois  so  fiercely  that  in  a  few  years  he 
had  so  thoroughly  conquered  them  that  no  Frenchman  ever 
needed  to  fear  them  again. 

The  French  king,  Louis  xiv.,  had  been  thinking  what  a 
glorious  chance  he  had  of  making  a  great  empire  in  America, 
and  Louis  de  Buade  tried  to  bring  this  about.  So  he  attacked 
the  English  colonists  in  New  England  to  win  their  land  for 
France.  But  the  fighting  went  very  badly  for  the  French, 
and  when  peace  was  made  in  the  year  1713  by  the  Treaty  of 
Utrecht,  they  had  to  give  up  the  land  where  they  had  first 
settled — Nova  Scotia,  as  well  as  Newfoundland  and  the  land 
round  Hudson  Bay. 

Still  they  held  the  land  round  the  St.  Lawrence,  and  they 
tried  to  make  up  for  what  they  had  to  give  to  England  by 
pushing  farther  west  and  founding  new  towns.  One  very 
brave  man  after  terrible  hardship  even  travelled  right  across 
Canada  to  the  Rocky  Mountains.     This  is  still  a  very  long 


THE  STORY  OF  CANADA  427 

journey  by  the  fastest  trains.  But  La  Verendrye,  as  this 
man  was  called,  had  no  train  to  go  by.  He  simply  struggled 
on,  sometimes  fighting  with  wild  beasts,  sometimes  with 
Indians.     Often  he  had  very  little  to  eat  for  days  together. 


George  Washington 

Other  Frenchmen  travelled  south  to  the  colony  of 
Louisiana,  and  founded  the  large  town  which  is  called  New 
Orleans.  It  was  through  these  Frenchmen,  who  were  trying 
to  get  as  much  land  as  they  could  to  the  South  of  Canada,  that 
a  young  man,  who  afterwards  became  very  famous,  first  came 
to  learn  how  to  fight.  George  Washington  had  not  much 
chance  of  education  in  the  things  most  boys  and  girls  of  his 
age  are  expected  to  know  now.  Most  of  what  he  knew  he 
had  taught  himself.  He  could  spell  and  write  good  English, 
which  very  few  colonists  could  do.  He  also  liked  mathe- 
matics. But  he  learned  other  things  which  were  much  more 
valuable  for  him.  He  had  finished  his  schooling  when  he  was 
fifteen.  He  had  on  the  whole  been  happy,  though  his  father 
died  when  he  was  young.  He  could  shoot,  hunt,  fish,  and 
look  after  the  big  plantations  which  had  belonged  to  his 
father,  and  now  belonged  partly  to  his  half-brother  and 
partly  to  himself 

He  had  learned  other  and  harder  lessons.  The  Washingtons 
lived  on  the  borders  of  Virginia,  and  life  was  not  very  safe 
there.  They  might  be  attacked  at  any  time  by  Indians  or 
by  the  Frenchmen  from  the  north.  George  learned  to  ride 
about  amongst  these  dangers  without  any  fear,  and  also  to  be 
cool  and  calm  if  he  was  attacked  by  man  or  beast. 

When  he  was  only  sixteen  he  was  sent  to  look  after  large 
plantations.  Even  then  he  knew  exactly  what  he  wanted, 
and  was  so  wise  and  sensible  that  grown  men  respected  him. 
When  he  was  nineteen  he  had  an  attack  of  the  dreadful 
disease  of  smallpox,  which  left  marks  on  his  face  till  he  died. 
He  was  only  just  a  man  when  the  Governor  of  Virginia  chose 


428  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

him  for  a  difficult  task.  The  French,  as  we  have  seen,  were 
pushing  their  settlements  South,  and  the  English  colonists 
thought  that  they  were  taking  some  of  the  land  which  they 
looked  on  as  their  own.  So  George  Washington  was  sent  to 
tell  them  to  go  back.  It  was  winter,  and  travelling  was  not 
easy  even  if  there  had  been  no  enemy  near.  But  he  made 
the  journey.  The  French  officers  were  very  polite  to  him, 
but  they  told  him  to  tell  the  Governor  that  they  meant  to 
stay  where  they  were. 

So  Washington  went  back.  He  did  not  seem  to  have  done 
much,  but  he  had  looked  carefully  at  the  country,  and  had 
made  up  his  mind  where  a  fort  should  be  built  to  keep  the 
enemy  back.  Next  year  he  was  made  a  lieutenant-colonel 
and  sent  to  fight  the  French  and  the  Indians  near  the  Ohio, 
where  they  had  made  their  camp.  He  defeated  them,  but  a 
month  later  had  to  give  in  and  go  back. 

The  next  year  he  went  back  again  under  General  Braddock 
to  try  to  take  Fort  Duquesne,  which  stood  where  the  large 
American  town  Pittsburg,  with  its  huge  smoky  factories  and 
iron  foundries,  now  stands.  General  Braddock  was  a  brave 
man  and  a  good  fighter,  but  he  did  not  know  how  to  fight 
against  the  French  and  Indians,  and  in  the  battle  he  was  de- 
feated, and  nearly  all  his  men  were  killed.  It  was  here  that 
Washington  first  showed  how  brave  a  fighter  he  was.  All 
over  the  battlefield  he  could  be  seen  on  horseback  cheering 
the  men  to  fight  harder.  JNIany  an  Indian  shot  at  him,  and 
they  could  shoot  well  and  straight,  but  somehow  he  escaped 
with  some  of  his  soldiers  unharmed  from  the  terrible  battle. 

A  few  months  after  his  return  he  was  made  head  of  all  the 
soldiers  in  Virginia.  He  was  only  twenty-three  years  old,  but 
he  defended  the  borders  of  Virginia  against  the  enemy,  and 
was  one  of  the  leaders  when,  three  years  later,  Fort  Duquesne 
was  taken.  The  rest  of  his  life  belongs  to  the  Story  of 
America,  which  is  told  in  the  next  chapter. 

One  of  the  most  terrible  things  in  this  warfare  between 
the  French  and  English  was  done  by  the  Governor  of  Nova 


THE  STORY  OF  CANADA  429 

Scotia.  This,  as  we  have  seen,  was  the  first  French  settlement 
made  in  Canada,  but  it  had  been  taken  by  the  English.  A 
great  number  of  the  people  who  still  lived  there,  however, 
were  simple  French  Catholics,  who  were  quiet,  peaceful  farmers 
and  traders.  They  were  still  Frenchmen  at  heart,  loving  the 
French  king  better  than  the  king  of  England.  In  the  year 
that  General  Braddock  was  defeated  at  Fort  Duquesne  the 
Governor  of  Nova  Scotia  suddenly  seized  six  thousand  of  the 
French  settlers  and  drove  them  from  their  homes  and  right 
out  of  Nova  Scotia. 

In  an  instant  their  peaceful  life  was  broken  up.  The 
country  they  loved,  and  in  which  they  had  lived  so  long  and 
their  fathers  before  them,  was  to  be  theirs  no  longer.  Many 
did  not  know  where  to  go  in  their  great  sorrow.  Some  got  as 
far  south  as  Louisiana.  Others  settled  near  Nova  Scotia,  and 
many  years  afterwards  a  few  found  their  way  back  to  the  land 
of  their  birth  again  after  terrible  suffering ;  but  most  of  them 
had  seen  it  for  the  last  time. 


General  Wolfe 

But  if  there  were  Englishmen  who  acted  with  great  cruelty, 
there  were  others  who  were  so  noble  that  their  names  will 
never  be  forgotten.  The  struggle  for  Canada  was  now  at  its 
fiercest,  and  although  the  English  had  won  some  victories,  it 
was  seen  by  statesmen  in  England  that  the  only  way  to  take 
Canada  was  to  take  Quebec.  Both  French  and  English 
seemed  to  feel  that  this  town  was  the  key  of  Canada.  It  was 
built  on  a  high  rock,  which  stood  at  the  head  of  the  Gulf  of 
St.  Lawrence.  From  the  river  it  seems  to  be  built  on  a 
precipice.  On  the  west  it  is  defended  by  steep  cliffs  called 
the  Heights  of  Abraham,  and  although  on  the  opposite  side 
the  land  slopes  more  gently,  this  was  naturally  watched  more 
carefully. 

The  French  General,  Montcalm,  was  a  brave  man  and  a 
clever  fighter,  and  when  he  thought  that  Quebec  was  to  be 


430 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


attacked  he  called  together  all  the  soldiers  he  could  get,  and 
brought  them,  with  many  French  settlers  and  Indians,  into  the 
city  to  defend  it.  The  leader  of  the  English  was  General 
Wolfe,  who  had  already  fought  in  North  America  before. 
Before  he  started  out  from  England  again  he  met  a  young 
lady  with  whom  he  fell  in  love.  They  were  to  be  married 
when  the  war  was  over  and  Wolfe  was  back  again. 

Wolfe  was  a  pale  slim  man,  rather  delicate,  but  few  men 
have  ever  been  braver  or  cleverer.  He  had  not  nearly  so 
many  soldiers  as  Montcalm,  and  they  were  not  soldiers  who 

had  had  much  training.     But  he  had 

made  up  his  mind  to  take   Quebec. 

It  was  a  dangerous  thing  to  remain 

in  the  St.  Lawrence,  for  in  the  winter 

the  water  freezes  hard  and  the  ships 

might   be  crushed   to   pieces.      But 

Wolfe,   although    the    autumn    was 

coming    on,    made    his    camp    on    a 

little  island  in  the  river  facing  Quebec 

and  waited  his  chance   to  take  the 

'M  city.      He   set   his  guns  to   fire  on 

the  city,  but  they  did  not  do  much 

harm  to  it,  and  Wolfe  saw  that  he 

must   try  to   take  Quebec  in   some 

other  way.    So  he  sailed  down  the  St.  Lawrence  and  tried  to 

take    Montcalm's   camp  below   the   city,  but  he  was  badly 

beaten  and  many  of  his  men  were  killed. 

He  was  now  ill  and  depressed.  He  could  hardly  drag  his 
weak  body  about.  But  he  did  not  mean  to  give  in,  and  when 
he  felt  a  little  stronger  he  made  a  bold  plan.  Montcalm 
thought  he  was  quite  safe  on  the  steep  west  side  of  the  town, 
for  he  thought  no  army  could  climb  the  Heights  of  Abraham, 
and  he  did  not  believe  that  even  the  foot  of  them  could  be 
reached  from  the  river. 

But  Wolfe  had  found  that  from  a  tiny  inlet  from  the  St. 
Lawrence  there  was  a  footpath  up  the  cliffs  which  led  to  the 


GENERAL   WOLFE 


THE  STORY  OF  CANADA  431 

Heights  of  Abraham.  In  the  dead  of  night  he  sailed  down 
the  river  with  his  men.  Cloths  had  been  wrapped  round  the 
oars  so  that  no  noise  could  be  heard.  No  light  was  shown, 
and  there  was  no  moon.  Somehow  the  soldiers  climbed  up 
the  narrow  footpath,  surprised  the  soldiers  at  the  top,  and  when 
daylight  came  Montcalm  was  astounded  to  see  nearly  four 
thousand  English  soldiers  on  the  Heights  of  Abraham  ready 
to  attack  Quebec. 

But  even  yet  the  city  was  not  won.  Montcalm  brought 
up  his  soldiers  for  battle,  and  at  first  the  English  were  driven 
back.  But  Wolfe  made  his  men  wait  until  the  French  came 
nearer  and  then  all  fire  at  once.  Men  fell  along  the  French 
line,  and  before  they  could  form  up  again  the  English  rushed 
upon  them.  But  Wolfe  was  wounded.  As  he  lay  dying  and 
full  of  pain  he  heard  his  soldiers  cry,  '  They  run  !  see  how  they 
run.'  'Who  run?'  the  dying  leader  asked,  and  was  told: 
'  The  enemy.'  He  was  quite  satisfied,  and  saying,  'Now  God 
be  praised,  I  will  die  in  peace,'  he  closed  his  eyes  and  died. 
Montcalm  was  also  wounded,  and  died  the  next  day. 

Five  days  afterwards,  on  the  11th  September  1759,  Quebec 
was  given  up  to  the  English,  and  when  the  Peace  of  Paris 
was  made  in  17B3,  the  whole  of  New  France  was  given  up  to 
the  English.  This  is  how  Canada  became  English  instead  of 
French. 

But  the  country  was  not  allowed  many  years  of  peace  to 
settle  down  and  grow,  though  the  English  Government,  which 
was  treating  the  American  colonists  so  unreasonably,  acted 
very  wisely  towards  the  Canadians.  The  country  was  to  be 
governed  from  Quebec,  and  the  Catholics  were  to  be  treated 
as  well  as  they  had  ever  been  under  the  French.  Only  the 
English  punishments  for  breaking  the  law  were  brought  in, 
and  in  other  things  the  French  laws  were  allowed.  The  result 
of  this  wise  treatment  was  soon  seen,  for  when  an  army  of 
American  soldiers  invaded  Canada  at  the  beginning  of  the 
American  War  of  Independence,  hoping  to  get  the  French 
to  join  them  against  England,  they  were  disappointed.     The 


432  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

Americans  took  Montreal,  but  were  not  able  to  take 
Quebec. 

But  the  War  of  American  Independence  was  very  important 
for  Canada.  The  United  States  and  Canada  became  two  separ- 
ate countries,  and  many  of  the  American  colonists  who  would 
not  give  up  the  King  of  England  left  their  lands  and  went  to 
find  new  homes  in  Canada.  The  Americans  would  not  give 
them  any  money  for  the  farms  and  lands  they  left  behind  them, 
and  these  new  men  of  Canada  did  not  soon  forget  it.  The  new 
Canadians  were  equal  to  more  than  half  all  the  Frenchmen  in 
Canada,  and  many  of  them  settled  in  the  land  which  is  now 
called  Ontario.  Here,  and  in  the  other  places  where  they 
made  their  homes,  they  were  given  large  pieces  of  land  to  live 
on  and  grow  corn  upon,  and  they  were  also  given  spades  and 
ploughs  in  place  of  those  they  had  left  behind. 

But  it  is  easy  to  understand  why  the  new  Canadians  did 
not  at  first  get  on  very  well  with  the  older  colonists.  They 
were  English  and  Protestants,  while  the  older  colonists  were 
French  and  Catholics.  It  was  not  long  before  it  was  thought 
that  it  would  be  wise  to  let  the  people  of  Ontario  govern 
themselves,  while  the  people  in  Quebec  made  laws  only  for 
those  people  who  lived  in  that  part  of  Canada.  Yet,  however 
badly  the  English  and  French  in  Canada  might  disagree,  they 
did  not  intend  to  join  the  Americans,  and  so  when  in  the 
year  1812  the  United  States  were  at  war  with  Great  Britain 
and  tried  to  take  Canada  their  soldiers  were  driven  back. 

There  were  some  however,  though  not  very  many,  of  the 
French  Canadians  who  did  not  like  being  ruled  by  an  English 
Governor,  and  rebellions  took  place.  The  leader  in  one  of 
these,  Louis  Papineau,  wished  to  make  the  people  of  the 
Quebec  part  of  Canada  join  the  United  States ;  but  there 
were  very  few  rebels,  and  the  rebellion  was  easily  put  down. 
One  thing  which  happened  just  after  this  was  the  joining  of 
Quebec  to  Ontario.  The  two  provinces  did  not  agree  very 
well  at  first,  but  thirty  years  later,  in  1867,  other  settlements 
in  Canada  joined  with  them.     The  colonies  called  Nova  Scotia, 


WINNIPEG    (fort    GARRYJ    FIFTY    YEARS    AGO. 
(From  a  painting.) 


WINNIPEG    TO-UAY  ;    LOOKING    UP    MAIN    STREET. 
(From  a  photo  by  Valentine,  Dundee.) 


THE  RAPID   GROWTH   OF   MODERN   CANADA. 


THE  STORY  OF  CANADA  433 

New  Brunswick,  and  Prince  Edward  Island  were  thinking  of 
joining  together,  and  Ontario  and  Quebec  suggested  that  they 
should  all  join.  This  was  agreed  to,  and  the  British  Parlia- 
ment passed  the  law  which  made  them  one  on  1st  July,  which 
has  ever  since  been  kept  as  the  birthday  of  the  '  Dominion  of 
Canada.' 

But  this  was  but  a  very  small  part  of  Canada  as  it  is 
to-day.  Other  huge  tracts  of  land  lay  to  the  north  and  west. 
Much  of  this  belonged  to  the  Hudson  Bay  Company,  which 
was  founded  in  1670  to  trade  in  furs  and  skins.  The  Com- 
pany had  made  settlements  round  the  lower  part  of  Hudson 
Bay  and  over  the  country  west  of  Ontario.  The  Dominion 
of  Canada  wanted  this  large  and  fertile  country  to  join  with 
the  rest  of  Canada,  and  the  Hudson  Bay  Company  agreed  at 
the  end  of  1869  to  give  up  their  land  to  the  Queen  for  a  sum 
of  money.  But  this  did  not  please  many  of  the  people  who 
lived  in  the  colonies  the  Company  had  founded. 

One  of  these  colonies  was  called  the  Red  River  Settle- 
ment, and  it  lay  round  the  town  which  is  now  called  Winni- 
peg, but  was  then  called  Fort  Garry.  Many  of  the  men  who 
lived  in  the  Red  River  Settlement  were  '  half-breeds,'  that  is 
half  French  and  half  Indian,  or  partly  English  and  partly 
Indian,  and  they  feared  that  when  the  Settlement  became 
part  of  Canada  there  would  be  changes  that  they  would  not 
like.  Louis  Riel,  one  of  these  half-breeds,  persuaded  the  men 
to  rebel.  They  made  him  their  leader,  and  shot  an  English- 
man who  refused  to  join  them.  This  made  the  people  of  the 
Dominion  very  angry,  and  Colonel  Garnet  Wolseley,  who 
was  afterwards  called  Lord  Wolseley,  was  sent  to  punish 
them.  He  marched  as  far  as  he  could,  sailed  over  the  Lake 
Superior,  and  took  Fort  Garry. 

Three  years  after  this  all  the  Settlements  in  Canada  had 
joined  the  Dominion,  but  Louis  Riel,  who  had  escaped  in  1870, 
lived  to  persuade  some  people  to  rebel  again.  This  second 
time,  in  1885,  there  was  much  fighting,  and  Riel  was  caught 
and  hanged. 

2  E 


434  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

In  the  same  year  the  great  Canadian  Pacific  Railway,  join- 
ing the  East  to  the  far  West  of  Canada,  was  opened.     There 
has  been  no  fighting  since.     Canada  has  gone  on,  growing 
richer  and  more  fertile  every  day.      New  towns  spring  up 
almost  like  magic.    New  states  have  been  formed.    There  are 
miles  of  wheat  fields,  huge  canals,  and  railways  ever  growing. 
The  Canadians  are  very  loyal  to  Great  Britain,  and  their  sol- 
diers were  sent  to  help  the  British  in  the  South  African  War. 
A  royal  prince,  the  King's  uncle,  represents  King  George  in 
Canada.     The  Canadians  are  building  great  ships  of  war  to 
help  the  British  Navy,  and  thousands  of  men  and  women  leave 
the  shores  of  Britain  every  year  to  become  Canadians,  and 
live    healthy,   open-air    lives    under    the    fair    skies  of  the 
Dominion. 


CHAPTER    XLI 

AMERICAN   INDEPENDENCE 

England  had  won  Canada  from  the  French,  but  she  was  soon 
to  lose  her  own  great  colonies  to  the  South  of  Canada.  Ever 
since  she  had  had  colonies  at  all,  England  had  said  that  all 
their  trade  should  be  hers.  They  were  not  allowed  to  trade 
with  any  other  country  but  the  mother- country.  The  colonies 
had  never  complained,  but  there  had  been  a  great  deal  of 
smuggling  and  trade  with  other  countries,  of  which  England 
had  taken  no  notice. 

Now  England,  after  all  her  fighting  and  her  many 
victories,  was  in  need  of  money,  and  Grenville,  the  chief  man 
in  the  English  Parliament  at  the  time,  passed  his  famous 
'  Stamp  Act.'  This  Act  said  that  for  all  documents  written 
or  printed  in  the  American  colonies,  and  for  all  newspapers, 
paper  should  be  used  which  had  first  been  stamped  by  the 
English  Government.  The  people  who  bought  the  paper 
had  to  pay  for  the  stamp. 

This  was  a  new  way  of  taxing  the  colonies,  and  they 
were  very  angry.  They  said  that  they  would  not  use  the 
paper,  and  in  the  next  year  it  was  given  up.  But  the 
English  Parliament  passed  a  law  saying  that  England  had 
the  right  to  make  any  laws  she  pleased  for  her  colonies.  This 
made  the  colonies  still  more  angry.  William  Pitt,  who  had 
now  been  made  Earl  of  Chatham,  said  that  England  had  not 
any  right  to  tax  the  colonies  without  their  consent.  Although 
Pitt  had  done  so  much  to  win  India  and  Canada  for  England, 
he  felt  that  the  mother-country  ought  to  leave  her  colonies 
free.  He  told  Parliament  that  he  'rejoiced  that  America  had 
resisted. ' 

436 


436  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

It  was  not  long  before  new  '  duties '  or  taxes  were  put 
upon  certain  things  going  to  the  colonies  from  England. 
The  colonists  must  pay  the  tax  and  the  English  have  the 
money.  The  people  of  America  had  offered  to  give  money 
to  the  English  Government  to  help  it,  but  they  were  very 
angry  at  this  new  attempt  to  tax  them.  The  colonists  began 
to  hate  every  Englishman  they  saw,  and  when  a  quarrel  broke 
out  in  Boston  between  some  of  the  people  in  the  street  and 
some  English  soldiers,  in  which  three  of  the  Americans  were 
killed,  the  colonists  called  it  the  '  Boston  Massacre.'  At  last 
all  the  new  taxes  were  taken  off  except  one  on  tea.  The  East 
India  Company  brought  a  great  deal  of  tea  from  India,  and 
generally  they  had  to  pay  a  tax  when  it  came  into  England. 
But  the  Company  was  very  poor  at  this  time,  and  so  the 
Government  let  it  off  from  paying  the  tax.  This  made  the 
Company  able  to  sell  the  tea  much  cheaper,  and  now  a  great 
quantity  of  tea  was  sent  over  the  sea  in  ships  to  America. 
But  the  colonists  were  told  that  they  must  pay  just  this  one 
tax  of  threepence  on  every  pound  of  tea  they  bought. 

Even  then  they  would  have  got  the  tea  at  a  very  low  price, 
but  they  were  very  indignant.  They  thought  that  the  Eng- 
lish were  playing  a  trick,  and  trying  to  tempt  them  to  buy  the 
cheap  tea  and  pay  a  tax  at  the  same  time.  So  no  one  would 
buy  the  tea,  and  ship  after  ship  sailed  back  to  England  with- 
out unloading.  One  ship  lay  at  anchor  in  Boston  Harbour. 
It  had  been  there  nineteen  days,  and  yet  looked  as  though  it 
meant  to  stay  there.  There  was  a  law  that  any  ship  must  un- 
load its  cargo  before  twenty  days  had  passed  from  its  arrival. 
So  the  men  of  Boston  made  up  their  minds  to  attack  this  ship 
which  had  broken  the  law. 

Some  of  them  painted  their  faces  and  stuck  feathers  in 
their  heads,  and  pretended  to  be  Indians.  They  rushed  on 
to  the  ship,  waving  pistols  and  tomahawks.  While  the 
English  captain  and  sailors  were  staring  in  surprise  they  cut 
open  the  boxes  in  which  the  tea  was,  and  emptied  it  into 
the   sea.      They   emptied   more  than   three   hundred   boxes 


AMERICAN  INDEPENDENCE 


437 


altogether.      Next   morning  tea  lay  drifting   along   all  the 
shore  of  Massachusetts. 

It  was  now  England's  turn  to  be  angry.  Every  one  felt 
that  the  men  of  Boston  had  begun  a  real  revolution.  No 
one  would  tell  who  the  men  were  who  had  disguised  them- 
selves as  Indians  and  done  this  thing,  and  so  an  order  came 


english  ships  of  war  at  boston  (where  the  '  tea-party  '  took 
place)  in   1768 

(From  an  engraving  published  at  Boston  in  1768). 


from  England  that  Boston  was  to  be  punished.  No  ship  was 
to  go  in  or  out  of  its  harbour,  and  its  trade  was  to  be  taken 
to  the  town  of  Salem.  For  the  future,  any  one  giving  trouble 
by  attacking  the  English  was  to  be  brought  over  to  England 
to  be  tried  before  English  judges  and  juries.  Every  one  felt 
that  this  was  unjust,  but  by  this  time  the  colonists  had  made 
up  their  minds  to  fight  for  their  liberties.  Men  from  all  the 
colonies  met  at  Philadelphia,  and  it  was  agreed  that  they 
should  join  together  and  resist  tlie  English. 


438  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

There  was  a  struggle  at  a  place  called  Lexington,  which 
made  the  two  sides  bitterer  than  ever  against  each  other. 
Some  English  soldiers  had  been  sent  from  Boston  to  destroy 
some  gunpowder  and  other  things  which  the  American  side 
had  collected  at  Concord,  eighteen  miles  away.  They  had  to 
pass  by  Lexington,  and  there  they  found  sixty  or  seventy 
men  ready  to  try  to  stop  them.  The  English  fired  twice  on 
these  men,  and  then  the  Americans  went  away.  But  eight 
of  them  had  been  killed.  The  English  did  their  work  at 
Concord,  and  then  set  out  again  for  Boston.  On  their  way 
back,  Americans  were  continually  shooting  at  them  from 
behind  buildings  and  trees  and  rocks,  to  take  revenge  for  the 
Americans  they  had  killed  on  their  way  to  Concord.  Many 
English  were  killed,  until  at  Lexington  one  thousand  men 
from  Boston  came  to  their  help. 

There  was  a  fight,  in  which  more  than  seventy  English 
and  about  fifty  Americans  were  killed.  The  English  really 
won,  and  most  of  them  got  safely  back  to  Boston ;  but  they 
had  lost  more  men  than  the  Americans,  who  grew  more 
hopeful  when  they  saw  that  their  volunteers,  who  were  not 
used  to  war,  could  fight  quite  well  against  the  English 
soldiers. 

The  Battle  of  Bunker's  Hill 

The  first  real  fight  was  called  the  '  battle  of  Bunker's 
Hill.'  A  few  hundred  volunteers,  men  with  ordinary  clothes 
and  any  guns  they  could  get,  were  placed  on  the  hills  outside 
Boston  to  defend  that  city.  Although  the  battle  is  called  after 
Bunker's  Hill,  it  was  really  fought  on  Breed's  Hill.  About 
four  thousand  soldiers  attacked  them.  Three  times  the 
volunteers  drove  them  down  the  hill,  but  at  last  the  soldiers 
won  their  way  up,  and  more  than  one  hundred  of  the  volun- 
teers lay  dead.  Then  another  '  Congress  '  met  at  Philadelphia, 
and  named  Colonel  George  Washington  General  of  the 
American  Army.  And  so  the  man  who  had  fought  so  well 
for  England  at  Fort  Duquesne  was  now  to  fight  against  her. 


AMERICAN  INDEPENDENCE 


439 


He  soon  won  Boston  back,  and  drove  the  English  soldiers  to 
Halifax. 

On  the  4th  of  July  1776  the  'Congress'  drew  up  the 
famous  '  Declaration  of  Independence  of  the  United  States 
of  America,'  by  which  an  end  was  put 
to  any  connection  of  the  colonies  with 
the  mother-country.  But  there  was 
still  fighting  to  be  done,  and  Washington 
had  a  very  hard  task  before  him. 

His  soldiers  were  badly 
clothed  and  fed.     Neither        W 
side  had  very  big  armies,     ^5::ii^ 
but   the  English   had  the  ^ 

soldiers  who  knew  already  something 
about  fighting.  Then  some  of  the 
colonists,  who  were  called  the  '  Loyal- 
ists,' were  against  the  Declaration,  and 
did  not  want  to  break  away  from  Eng- 
land. These  were  a  hindrance.  There 
were  many  others  who  hated  fight- 
ing, and  most  of  the  volunteers  only 
joined  the  army  for  a  certain  fixed  time, 
and  would  then  go  home,  often  just 
when  they  might  have  been  useful. 
But  the  English  on  their  side  did  very 
foolish  things.  They  seemed  to  think 
that  it  would  be  an  easy  thing  to 
conquer  the  Americans,  or  to  believe 
that  they  were  not   really  in  earnest. 

Pitt,  who  had  known  so  well  how  to  choose  the  best  men  as 
officers,  was  no  longer  in  power,  and  most  of  the  officers  on 
the  English  side  were  very  poor  commanders. 

Sir  WiUiam  Howe,  the  brother  of  Lord  Howe,  who  had 
been  sent  by  Wolfe  to  fight  in  Canada  and  had  died  there, 
and  of  Admiral  Lord  Howe,  was  a  very  different  man  from 
his  brothers.     He  made  up  his  mind  to  take  Philadelphia, 


GEORGE    WASHINGTON 


440  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

and  took  it.  But  his  armies  were  all  far  apart,  instead  of 
keeping  close  and  helping  each  other.  One  of  them,  under 
General  Burgoyne,  surrendered  to  the  Americans  at  Saratoga 
in  1777.  Next  year  the  French,  who  were  still  full  of  anger 
at  the  great  victories  England  had  won  over  them  in  India 
and  Canada,  agreed  to  the  Independence  of  the  American 
colonies,  and  France  and  England  were  once  more  at  war. 

Pitt,  now  old  and  ill,  begged  Parliament  to  try  to  win  the 
good-will  of  the  Americans  again.  '  You  cannot  conquer 
America,'  he  told  Parliament,  and  begged  them  to  show  a 
spirit  of  friendship  and  mercy  to  the  colonists.  But  the  king, 
George  iii.,  did  not  like  Pitt,  and  would  not  give  him  any 
power  in  the  country.  George  iii.,  who  had  boasted  that  he 
was  *  born  and  bred  a  Briton'  and  was  not  at  all  German, 
like  his  father  and  grandfather,  could  not  bear  the  idea  of 
giving  in. 

George  had  a  great  deal  of  power  over  Parliament,  and 
chose  the  men  who  governed  the  country.  It  was  greatly 
his  fault  that  England  had  been  so  foolish  in  her  treatment 
of  America.  Pitt  made  one  last  great  speech  in  the  House 
of  Lords  in  the  April  of  1778.  He  fell  back  in  a  fit  when  his 
speech  was  over,  for  the  excitement  had  been  too  much  for 
him,  and  he  died  a  few  weeks  after. 

After  this  there  was  never  any  chance  of  America  being 
won  back.  England  had  to  fight  hard  against  France  and 
Spain  at  sea.  The  French  ships  helped  the  Americans  to 
take  Yorktown,  in  Virginia,  where  Lord  Cornwallis  and  a 
large  army  had  to  give  in  to  them.  Lord  Cornwallis  was 
the  cleverest  of  the  English  officers  who  fought  in  the  war. 
This  was  really  the  end  of  the  war,  though  New  York,  which 
had  refused  to  join  in  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  was 
still  held  by  the  English. 

Peace  was  made  in  1783  with  both  France  and  America. 
Admiral  Rodney  had  shown  by  his  victories  over  the  French 
and  Spanish  fleets  that  England  was  still  the  greatest  sea 
power.     But  she  now  openly  agreed  to  American  Independ- 


AMERICAN  INDEPENDENCE  441 

ence,  and  all  the  thirteen  colonies  were  now  joined  as  a 
federal  republic.  That  is,  each  state  governed  itself  in  its 
own  affairs  and  sent  representatives  to  the  Congress,  which 
settled  the  affairs  in  which  they  all  had  a  part. 

The  new  republic  was  called,  and  is  still,  the  United 
States  of  America.  Its  capital  was  New  York.  Its  first 
president  was  the  hero  George  Washington,  old  and  grey- 
before  his  time  through  his  labours  and  suffering  for  his 
country. 

So  England  lost  her  first  great  group  of  colonies.  A 
clever  Frenchman  once  said  that  a  colony  will  always  break 
away  from  the  mother-country  when  it  is  old  enough  and 
strong  enough  to  look  after  itself,  but  we  have  no  proof 
of  this.  Indeed  England  has  many  colonies  to-day  which 
are  proud  of  belonging  to  her,  but  she  has  learned  her 
lesson,  and  gives  them  every  liberty  she  can. 

Meanwhile  the  United  States,  which  at  first  were  the 
thirteen  colonies  on  the  east  coast  of  America,  have  now 
spread  right  across  the  continent.  New  states  were  formed 
in  'the  West.'  People  from  the  older  states  and  from 
Europe  went  out  into  these  wild  parts  round  the  Ohio,  where 
the  new  states,  called  Ohio,  Kentucky,  and  Tennessee,  grew 
up.  Although  these  states  were  called  the  '  West,'  they  are, 
of  course,  in  the  eastern  part  of  the  continent.  They  are  west 
from  the  older  states,  but  beyond  them  lies  more  than  half 
the  continent.  Before  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century 
all  this  was  won  by  the  United  States.  The  great  province 
of  Louisiana,  which  Napoleon  took  from  Spain,  was  sold 
to  the  United  States  for  three  million  pounds.  Further 
west  still,  some  of  the  land  belonged  to  the  Hudson  Bay 
Company  and  some  to  Mexico,  but  the  United  States  got  it 
all  in  the  end,  until  the  republic  stretched  from  coast  to 
coast. 

At  first  these  settlers  in  the  wild  West  led  a  very  hard 
life  indeed.  There  was  plenty  of  rich  land,  which  gave  them 
food,    but   the   only  way  of  getting  things    made   in    other 


442  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

countries  was  to  have  them  carried  in  ships  along  the  rivers. 
This  was  a  very  slow  way  when  the  distances  were  so  great, 
and  it  was  not  until  railways  were  invented  that  the  western 
states  were  able  to  send  great  quantities  of  the  things  they 
grew  to  the  eastern  states  and  to  Europe,  and  so  get  back 
the  things  manufactured  there,  and  so  lead  more  comfortable 
and  less  rough  lives. 

Th^  End  of  Slavery 

In  the  new  states,  just  as  in  the  old  Southern  states,  there 
was  a  great  deal  of  cotton  grown,  and  slaves  were  used  on  the 
plantations.  But  everywhere  in  the  nineteenth  century,  as  we 
shall  see,  there  was  a  new  love  of  freedom  growing  up,  and 
people  began  to  think  it  a  shameful  thing  that  men  should 
own  their  fellow- men  as  though  they  were  cattle. 

About  the  time  that  the  war  between  the  American 
colonies  and  England  broke  out,  a  great  English  judge  had 
declared  that  any  slave  setting  foot  on  English  soil  became 
free  at  that  moment.  In  a  few  years  Parliament  did  away 
with  all  the  slave  trade  in  English  ships,  and  paid  twenty 
million  pounds  to  slave  owners  in  her  colonies  in  the  West 
Indies  and  South  Africa  to  set  their  slaves  free.  It  was 
not  long  before  other  European  countries  followed  her 
example. 

It  was  in  the  Southern  states  of  America  that  the 
greatest  number  of  the  slaves  were.  The  owners  of  the 
big  plantations  had  dozens  of  them,  doing  the  work  of  the 
house  as  well  as  the  plantations.  The  men  would  work 
on  the  plantation  and  the  women  would  be  cooks  and 
nurses  in  the  house.  Their  little  children  grew  up  on  the 
plantation  and  belonged  to  the  master  too.  Many  slaves 
were  happy,  for  they  had  good  masters,  but  they  were  never 
safe.  Cruel  masters  might  beat  them,  or  worse  still,  sell  their 
wives  and  children  to  other  people.  A  family  might  be 
broken  up  and  never  see  each  other  a^in.  This  was  very 
dreadful. 


AMERICAN  INDEPENDENCE  443 

At  last  the  men  of  the  Northern  states  said  that  all 
the  slaves  should  be  set  free.  A  lady  wrote  a  story  called 
Uncle  T'oms  Cabin,  which  told  all  about  the  sufferings  of 
the  slaves,  and  at  last  the  men  of  the  North  could  not  bear 
the  idea  that  there  should  any  longer  be  slaves  in  their 
country.  They  wanted  a  law  passed  to  free  all  the  slaves. 
They  said  that  the  government  could  give  money  to  the  slave 
owners  to  make  up  to  them  for  losing  their  slaves. 

But  the  men  of  the  South  were  very  angry.  They  said 
they  would  never  agree  to  this.  In  the  North  slavery  was 
abolished,  and  the  men  of  the  North  were  very  angry  against 
the  South.  John  Brown,  a  Northerner,  went  to  Virginia, 
and  calling  all  the  slaves  he  could  find  to  follow  him,  he 
told  them  to  fight  for  their  freedom.  But  he  was  taken 
prisoner  and  hanged.  He  had  certainly  been  acting  against 
the  law,  but  the  Northerners  were  very  indignant. 

At  last  the  Southern  states  said  they  would  have  a 
republic  of  their  own,  and  elected  a  president.  But  the 
Northerners  said  they  had  no  right  to  do  this,  and  Abraham 
Lincoln,  the  president,  felt  that  America  would  never  be 
safe  and  strong  if  it  were  broken  up  like  this.  Abraham 
Lincoln  was  one  of  the  greatest  presidents  America  ever 
had.  He  had  been  a  poor  boy  living  in  a  log  cabin  in  the 
wild  western  state  of  Indiana,  but  he  had  read  every  book  he 
could  get,  and  had  grown  to  be  a  very  wise  man.  He  was 
determined  to  keep  the  states  together  even  if  slavery  had  to 
go  on  in  the  South,  but  the  Southerners  would  not  listen  to 
him  now. 

A  great  Civil  War  broke  out.  There  were  heroes  on 
both  sides  and  great  victories  and  defeats.  The  men  of  the 
North  marched  to  battle  singing  in  chorus  : 

'  John  Brown's  body  lies  a-mouldering  in  the  grave, 
But  his  soul  goes  marching  on,' 

for  they  could  never  forgive  the  Southerners  for  killing  John 
Brown.     The    greatest   leader  the  South  had  was  Jackson, 


444  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

who  was  called  by  his  men  *  Stonewall  Jackson,'  because 
they  said  when  men  were  falling  wounded  and  dead  around 
him  he  stood  as  steady  as  ever,  *  like  a  stone  wall.' 

In  the  middle  of  the  war  Lincoln  declared  that  all  men 
were  free  in  North  and  South  alike.  Soon  afterwards 
'  Stonewall '  Jackson  was  killed,  shot  by  mistake  by  his  own 
men.  At  last,  after  two  more  years  of  fighting,  the  Southern 
army  had  to  surrender.  Almost  every  family  in  North  and 
South  alike  had  lost  a  father,  or  brother,  or  son  in  the  war. 
But  through  much  suffering  two  great  things  had  been  done. 
The  states  remained  united  and  the  slaves  were  free. 

But  Abraham  Lincoln,  who  had  done  so  much  for  his 
country,  and  had  suffered  terribly  when  he  thought  of  all 
the  unnecessary  waste  of  men's  lives,  was  himself  to  die  a 
martyr  at  last.  He  was  in  the  theatre  at  Washington  one 
evening  shortly  after  peace  was  made,  when  a  man  from  the 
South  shot  at  him  and  killed  him,  shouting :  '  The  South  is 
avenged.'  Lincoln  was  taken  back  to  be  buried  near  his  old 
home  in  the  wild  west. 

To-day  the  United  States,  whose  history  we  have  been 
able  to  tell  only  in  this  short  way,  is  one  of  the  most  wonder- 
ful countries  in  the  world.  It  is  covered  with  great  cities 
filled  with  people  who  are  among  the  cleverest  in  the  world. 
The  American  love  of  freedom  has  become  a  proverb. 

Even  more  than  in  England,  perhaps,  people  feel  there 
that  every  one  should  have  equal  chances ;  that  it  does  not 
matter  how  poor  a  man  may  be,  or  how  lowly  his  birth,  if 
he  has  brains  and  character.  Nearly  all  the  greatest  inven- 
tions now  come  from  America. 

New  York,  with  its  great  wide  straight  streets  and  its 
mansions  of  white  marble,  where  its  rich  men  and  million- 
aires live,  is  one  of  the  most  beautiful  cities  in  the  world. 
And  every  year  millions  of  people  pour  from  Europe  into  the 
United  States  :  Russians  who  find  that  their  own  government 
does  not  give  them  enough  of  freedom,  Italians  who  seek 
riches  which  their  own  land  cannot  give  them,  Norwegians, 


AMERICAN  INDEPENDENCE  445 

Swedes,  Germans.  Many  of  the  most  energetic  people  from 
all  the  countries  of  Europe  are  going  to  seek  their  fortune 
in  *  the  States.'  It  is  interesting  to  see  how  these  all  settle 
down  and  mix  together  to  form  the  American  people,  all 
speaking  the  English  language,  which  the  Pilgrim  Fathers 
took  to  the  land  three  hundred  years  ago. 

One  drawback  to  the  good  feeling  in  America  is  that 
many  of  the  white  people  cannot  yet  believe  that  the 
'  coloured '  people,  the  negro  descendants  of  the  slaves  whom 
Lincoln  freed,  are  their  equals.  There  is  still  a  great  deal  of 
ill-feeling,  which  we  can  only  hope  will  pass  away  in  time, 
and  the  negroes  get  their  full  share  in  the  life  of  the  great 
republic. 


CHAPTER  XLII 

AUSTRALASIA 

One  strange  result  of  the  American  War  of  Independence 
was  the  founding  of  colonies  in  the  great  continent  at  the 
opposite  side  of  the  world  from  Great  Britain — Australia. 
Before  that  time  men  who  had  committed  crimes  in  England 
had  been  practically  sold  to  the  American  colonists,  who  made 
them  work  on  their  plantations.  After  the  war  this  could  not 
be  done  any  longer,  and  so,  when  the  discoveries  of  Captain 
Cook  were  making  people  think  of  Australia,  it  was  thought  a 
good  thing  to  send  the  convicts  out  there  as  colonists.  In 
this  way  it  happened  that,  in  March  1787,  nine  ships  set  out 
for  Australia  carrying  a  large  number  of  men  who  had  broken 
the  laws  of  England. 

It  was  a  continent  that  for  hundreds  of  years  had  been 
called  the  southern  land  or  Australia,  for  men  who  came  to 
know  in  one  way  or  another  that  such  a  land  existed,  thought 
it  stretched  to  the  South  Pole.  The  Chinese  knew  of  it 
in  the  thirteenth  century,  and  several  men  are  supposed  to 
have  discovered  it  three  centuries  later ;  but  the  first  dis- 
coverers about  whom  we  can  be  sure  were  Dutchmen,  who 
in  the  seventeenth  century  sailed  along  the  western  coast. 
De  Torres,  a  Spaniard,  sailed  through  the  sea  which  separates 
Australia  on  the  north  from  New  Guinea,  and  he  may  have 
seen  the  country,  and  the  water  is  now  called  Torres  Strait 
after  him.  The  Dutchmen  sailed  from  an  island  not  far  from 
Australia,  called  Java,  and  it  was  Abel  Tasman  who,  sailing 
from  there,  discovered  the  island  of  Tasmania  in  1642. 

The    first   Englishman   to    visit   Australia   was    William 

446 


448  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

Dampier,  who  reached  it  in  1688.  He  went  there  again  in 
1699,  and  thought  it  a  very  poor  country,  with  Httle  grow- 
ing on  the  land,  and  only  one  kind  of  animal.  This,  from  his 
description,  is  now  known  to  have  been  the  kangaroo.  The 
man  who  found  out  most  about  Australia  was  Captain  Cook, 
who  sailed  out  to  make  discoveries  about  the  star  which  is 
called  Venus.  In  October  1769  he  saw  the  land  which  is 
now  called  New  Zealand,  and  he  called  the  water  in  which 
the  ship  stopped  Poverty  Bay,  because  the  people  who  lived 
there  would  not  help  him  in  any  way,  and  were  very  quick  to 
attack  him.  He  sailed  on  and  came  to  the  East  coast  of 
Australia  in  April  1770.  He  made  the  ship  stop  in  a  little 
bay  which  lies  very  near  where  the  large  town  Sydney  now 
stands.  He  called  the  bay  Botany  Bay,  because  there  were 
so  many  strange  plants  and  flowers  there ;  but  what  struck 
him  most  was  the  strangeness  of  the  natives. 

When  the  ship  sailed  into  the  bay  a  number  of  them  were 
cooking  their  food  at  a  fire,  but  they  took  no  notice  of 
the  ship.  They  did  not  seem  to  look  even  when  the  ship 
let  down  the  anchor  with  a  great  noise.  But  when  the 
captain  tried  to  set  foot  on  the  shore,  some  of  them  stood  up 
and  threatened  him  with  their  spears.  Even  when  one  of 
the  natives  was  shot  in  the  leg  for  throwing  a  stone,  they 
seemed  not  to  be  afraid,  and  it  was  with  great  difficulty  that 
Captain  Cook  and  his  men  could  land.  But  they  did  so 
several  times,  and  before  sailing  away  they  hoisted  the  Union 
Jack,  to  show  that  the  land  in  future  belonged  to  Great 
Britain. 

Captain  Cook  sailed  slowly  along  the  coast  towards  the 
North,  and  he  called  it  New  South  Wales,  as  he  thought  it 
looked  like  the  coast  of  Wales.  He  sailed  to  Cape  York,  the 
point  of  Australia  which  is  farthest  north,  and  again  he 
hoisted  the  Union  Jack  before  sailing  away  to  England.  He 
was  later  sent  out  to  Australia  again,  and  this  time  he 
visited  Tasmania  as  well  as  New  Zealand;  and  he  was 
making  discoveries  in  another  part  of  the  ocean  when  the 


^N^ 


AUSTRALASIA  449 

savage  natives  of  a  small  island  killed  him.  Brave  and  clever 
as  Captain  Cook  was,  he  never  forgot  to  be  kind  and  thoughtful 
about  his  sailors. 

It  was  other  Englishmen  who  told  the  world  all  about 
the  coasts  of  Australia,  but  the  land  within  was  not  known 
for  many  years.  Captain  Flinders  sailed  round  Australia 
in  1806,  and  in  1831  a  ship  named  the  Beagle  left  England 
with  a  man  on  board  whose  name  will  never  be  forgotten. 
Charles  Darwin  was  sent  out  on  this  voyage  to  find  out  all 
he  could  about  the  rocks,  plants,  and  animals  of  the  countries 
they  visited,  and  it  was  this  voyage  that  began  the  work 
which  has  helped  people  to  understand  more  about  how  the 
first  men  came  to  be  born  on  earth,  and  has  led  them  to  think 
that  man  is  only  the  highest  of  an  immense  number  of 
animals  which  little  by  little,  in  one  way  or  another,  have 
grown  more  powerful  and  cleverer  until  the  highest  was  born. 
But  it  is  more  important  for  the  present  to  point  out  that 
Darwin  in  the  Beagle  went  round  Australia,  New  Zealand, 
and  Tasmania,  examined  the  coasts  very  carefully,  and  wrote 
down  what  was  found  out. 


The  First  Colonists  in  Australia 

But  before  this  many  things  had  happened  in  Australia. 
The  first  colonists  consisted  of  564  men  and  192  women 
convicts,  and  about  200  soldiers.  They  landed  at  Botany 
Bay,  but  Captain  Philip,  who  was  the  head  of  the  colony,  did 
not  find  it  a  good  place  to  live  in  ;  so  he  moved  the  settlement 
to  Port  Jackson,  near  Sydney.  They  had  brought  with  them 
cows,  horses,  sheep,  pigs,  goats,  and  fowls,  as  well  as  plenty  of 
seed  to  sow,  and  farming  tools.  But  at  first  they  found  it 
very  hard  to  make  things  grow,  and  many  more  convicts 
came,  and  many  years  passed  before  they  found  out  how  to 
till  the  land  and  settle  down  in  comfort.  In  1793  people  who 
were  not  convicts  began  to  go  to  New  South  Wales,  and  they 
were  given  land  and  food.     Soon  the  town  of  Sydney  began 

2  F 


450  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

to  grow,  and  by  the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth  century  it 
had  already  schools,  churches,  a  newspaper,  and  a  theatre. 

A  few  miles  inland  from  Sydney  is  a  range  of  mountains, 
and  for  a  long  time  these  prevented  men  from  trying  to  find 
out  what  lay  farther  inland.  But  under  Captain  Macquarie, 
who  became  governor  in  1809,  a  track  was  opened  over  the 
mountains,  and  this  led  to  the  discovery  of  fertile  pasture-land 
beyond.  An  army  officer  soon  showed  that  sheep  could  be 
reared  there,  and  settlers  flocked  to  the  new  lands. 

Other  parts  of  Australia  were  now  being  turned  into 
convict  settlements  :  Queensland  to  the  north,  Victoria  to  the 
south,  and  Western  Australia  were  all  colonized  by  convicts, 
and  all  had  in  consequence,  at  some  time,  to  fight  against  one 
great  peril.  The  way  in  which  the  first  convict  settlements 
were  governed  was  unlike  an  ordinary  colony.  The  men 
during  the  day  would  work  in  the  open  air,  building  houses, 
tilling  the  fields,  and  watching  the  sheep.  Then  at  night  they 
would  be  brought  back  before  dark  to  lie  in  a  sort  of  barracks, 
guarded  by  soldiers  through  the  long  hot  nights,  until  the  cool 
morning  came.  Sometimes  convicts  who  had  behaved  well 
for  a  time  were  lent  to  a  farmer  or  shepherd,  and  then  they 
would  have  more  freedom.  They  would  work  very  much  like 
any  farm  labourer,  although  sometimes  they  were  very  ill- 
treated  by  the  farmers  who  were  set  over  them.  In  any  case 
life  was  very  dreary  and  hopeless,  and  while  it  was  difficult  to 
escape  from  the  prisons  in  the  towns,  it  was  almost  easy  to 
run  away  from  a  farm,  especially  by  stealing  a  horse. 

So  in  time  many  of  these  men  escaped.  Some  of  them 
had  been  treated  very  cruelly  and  they  meant  to  have  revenge. 
All  of  them  were  breaking  the  law  by  running  away,  and 
knowing  that  they  would  be  punished  if  they  were  taken 
again — for  there  were  brutal  things  done  to  convicts  in  those 
days,  and  especially  in  places  far  from  England — they  did  not 
care  how  cruel  they  were  themselves.  Sometimes  they  would 
band  together  and  then  march  to  a  lonely  farmhouse,  where 
they  would  steal  everything  valuable  and  shoot  any  one  who 


AUSTRALASIA  451 

resisted.  Very  often  they  shot  people  just  for  amusement. 
At  times  they  would  wait  till  a  number  of  travellers  were  on 
their  way  to  a  large  town.  Suddenly,  when  the  coach  had 
reached  a  lonely  spot,  they  would  appear,  and,  while  some  of 
them  stood  outside  holding  loaded  revolvers,  others  would 
take  from  the  travellers  everything  they  had. 

Naturally  the  free  settlers,  and  those  convicts  who  had 
finished  their  imprisonment  and  wished  to  start  afresh,  tried 
to  catch  these  robbers,  who  were  called  bush-rangers,  because 
they  lived  among  the  bushes  and  trees  which  grew  not  far 
from  the  settlements,  and  which  had  to  be  removed  when  men 
wanted  to  till  the  land.  But  it  was  not  easy.  Often  the  bush- 
rangers paid  men  in  the  towns  to  let  them  know  when  they 
were  to  be  attacked,  and  there  were  many  good  hiding-places 
in  the  interior  of  the  country  which  it  was  difficult  to  find, 
and  out  of  which  it  was  very  difficult  indeed  to  get  even  one 
or  two  men  if  they  had  guns. 

It  was  much  worse  after  1851  when  gold  was  'first  found 
in  Australia.  Men  flocked  out  from  England  and  great 
quantities  of  gold  were  taken  from  the  mines.  When  this 
was  found  near  small  settlements  it  was  kept  until  there  was 
a  very  large  quantity,  and  then  it  was  sent  to  the  nearest 
large  town.  Men  would  go  with  it  to  protect  it ;  but  this  did 
not  prevent  the  bush-rangers  waiting  until  the  '  gold  train  ' 
had  reached  some  suitable  place,  when  they  would  suddenly 
shoot  a  number  of  the  men  and  force  the  rest  to  let  them 
take  the  gold.  Sometimes  they  were  daring  enough  to  march 
into  a  town  and  attack  the  bank. 

One  very  famous  bush-ranger  was  called  Ned  Kelly.  His 
brother,  Daniel,  had  stolen  a  horse  in  Victoria,  and  when  the 
policemen  came  to  take  him,  Ned  shot  at  one  and  wounded 
him.  Then  he  had  to  run  away.  He  was  joined  by  other  bad 
men,  and  though  eight  thousand  pounds  was  offered  to  any  one 
who  would  take  the  men,  they  were  not  taken  for  two  years. 
They  were  at  length  traced  to  a  wooden  hut  in  June  1880, 
and  the  police  surrounded  it.    All  but  Kelly  were  shot,  and 


452 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


he  |was  taken  and  hanged.  This  was  the  last  of  the  bush- 
rangers ;  but  it  is  strange  to  think  that  they  could  still  exist 
when  Australia  had  grown  so  active  and  so  rich,  and  when 
people  who  are  still  young  were  alive. 

Long  before  the  death  of  Ned  Kelly  Australia  had  begun 
to  settle  down  into  the  condition  in  which  it  is  known  to-day. 
At  first  New  South  Wales  included  not  only  the  whole  of 


DIGGING    AND    WASHING    FOR    GOLD    IN    AUSTRALIA    IN    1851 

(From  a  drawing  made  in  1851). 


Australia  but  also  New  Zealand  and  the  islands  near ;  but 
before  1840  South  Australia,  West  Australia,  Tasmania,  and 
New  Zealand  were  cut  off,  and  before  1860  New  South 
Wales  had  become  almost  exactly  what  it  is  to-day.  Queens- 
land was  the  last  to  be  treated  as  a  colony.  West  Australia 
was  the  colony  to  which  the  last  convicts  were  sent,  and  it 
was  not  until  1868  that  transportation  was  stopped.  Even 
Tasmania  had  for  many  years  secured  the  right  to  be  treated 
as  a  colony  and  not  as  a  convict  settlement. 

By  the  year  1856  New  South  AVales,  the  oldest  colony, 
had  become  a  large  and  rich  settlement :  in  1850  a  university 


AUSTRALASIA  453 

was  opened  in  Sydney,  and  four  years  later  the  first  railway 
was  finished  and  in  use.  The  settlers  now  wished  to  choose 
a  parliament  from  among  themselves  and  to  rule  themselves ; 
and  in  1856  this  was  agreed  to  by  the  parliament  of  Great 
Britain.  Each  of  the  other  colonies  has  grown  in  the  same 
way.  First  a  small  settlement  was  formed ;  then  by  the 
industry  of  the  settlers,  most  of  them  convicts,  the  settle- 
ment began  to  grow.  Soon  towns  were  made  in  other  parts 
of  the  colony,  and  then  the  colony  was  treated  as  separate 
from  the  parent.  New  South  Wales.  The  colony  grew  still 
larger  and  richer,  more  free  settlers  came,  and  at  length  it 
was  thought  great  enough  to  rule  itself. 

But  Australia  has  not  grown  without  its  troubles.  The 
discovery  of  gold  increased  the  number  of  free  settlers  to 
an  enormous  extent,  and  the  new  colonists  were  bold  and 
independent  men,  who  had  respect  for  themselves  and  for  little 
else.  This  made  the  colonies  democratic,  and  it  caused  the 
bitter  struggles  between  the  early  colonists,  who  now  owned  a 
great  part  of  the  land,  and  the  more  democratic,  who  thought 
that  the  land  should  be  owned  by  as  many  as  possible.  It  also 
did  a  good  deal  to  bring  nearer  the  struggle  between  those 
who  work  and  those  who  employ,  which  has  resulted  in  the 
victory  of  the  workers. 

When  the  colonies  were  all  large  and  rich,  many  men 
began  to  feel  that  they  ought  to  join  together  like  the 
provinces  of  Canada,  each  colony  making  laws  for  things 
which  concerned  itself,  but  the  colonies  together  making  laws 
for  other  things. 

For  some  years  men  talked  about  the  new  idea,  but  some 
people  felt  so  strongly  against  it  that  it  could  not  be  brought 
to  pass.  At  length,  in  1900,  it  was  agreed  to,  and  on  1st 
January  1901  the  Commonwealth  of  Australia  commenced  to 
exist.  It  has  passed  some  wise  laws,  one  of  them  being  that 
every  man  is  bound  to  be  trained  as  a  soldier,  so  that  if 
necessary  he  will  be  able  to  fight  for  his  country.  The 
Commonwealth  of  Australia  is  very  loyal.     Its  soldiers  fought 


454  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

side  by  side  with  the  British  at  Khartoum  and  in  South 

Africa,  and  it  has  recently  helped  in  providing  ships  for  the 

fleet. 

New  Zealand 

On  his  last  voyage  Captain  Cook  hoisted  the  Union  Jack 
in  New  Zealand,  but  Great  Britain  did  not  take  the  country, 
and  explorers  belonging  to  other  nations  visited  the  islands. 
Then  in  1814  came  Samuel  Marsden  and  a  number  of 
English  missionaries,  and  although  they  taught  Christianity 
to  the  natives,  and  in  this  way  persuaded  the  different  tribes 
to  remain  at  peace  with  each  other,  still  Great  Britain  would 
not  look  on  New  Zealand  as  an  English  colony.  It  was  not 
until  January  1840,  when  the  British  Government  came  to 
know  that  France  intended  to  colonize  the  islands,  that  an 
officer  of  the  British  Navy  was  told  to  go  to  New  Zealand 
and  take  possession  of  them.  The  French  settlers  arrived  a 
few  months  later,  but  as  the  land  now  belonged  to  Great 
Britain  they  became  British  subjects. 

The  Maoris,  as  the  natives  are  called,  are  not  like  the 
natives  of  Australia.  Tall  and  strongly  built,  they  have  a 
brown  complexion,  and  tattoo  their  bodies  in  strange 
patterns.  But  they  are  very  intelligent,  and  in  the  early 
years  of  the  first  colonists  there  were  many  struggles  with 
them.  Their  courage  was  extraordinary,  and  as  they  had 
good  guns  it  took  years  of  fighting  to  make  them  understand 
that  the  white  men  had  come  to  the  islands  to  stay,  and  that 
they  meant  to  be  the  rulers. 

Most  of  the  fighting  went  on  in  the  north  island.  The 
Maoris'  favourite  way  of  fighting  was  to  build  a  stockade, 
a  sort  of  very  strong  fence,  behind  which  they  dug  pits  for 
the  men  to  shoot  from.  Sometimes  great  numbers  of  white 
men  would  be  killed  before  the  Maoris  could  be  driven  from 
the  stockade.  Some  of  them  hated  Christianity  as  well  as 
hating  the  foreigners,  and  so  they  fought  with  great  fierce- 
ness. But  others — some  of  them  brave  chiefs — fought  for 
the  English. 


AUSTRALASIA  455 

Although  the  first  settlers  had  arrived  in  New  Zealand  in 
1814,  it  was  not  until  1870  that  the  Maoris  were  finally 
conquered.  But  meanwhile  many  changes  had  taken  place. 
Nine  separate  colonies  had  been  founded  in  New  Zealand  and 
each  had  its  own  way  of  government,  and  they  had  little  to  do 
with  one  another.  The  colony  was  allowed  to  govern  itself  in 
1852,  but  for  years  there  were  struggles  between  the  New 
Zealand  Government  and  the  councils  which  ruled  the  nine 
separate  states.  At  length,  in  1876  the  states  were  abolished, 
and  New  Zealand  has  since  been  a  single  colony. 

It  has  grown  steadily.  The  land  is  very  good  for  rearing 
sheep,  and  so  much  of  it  has  been  divided  up  into  strips  for 
sheep-farming.  Gold  was  discovered  in  1853,  and  this  brought 
to  the  colony  great  numbers  of  men  who  wanted  to  get  rich 
quickly.  Railways  and  telegraphs  soon  began  to  appear ; 
good  roads  were  made,  and  men  were  encouraged  to  leave 
England  and  settle  in  New  Zealand. 

Like  the  Australians,  the  men  who  live  in  New  Zealand 
are  very  loyal  to  Great  Britain,  and  men  there  were  very 
eager  to  go  out  to  South  Africa  to  help  the  British  army  in 
the  war.  Like  the  Australians,  too,  they  have  added  to  the 
ships  of  the  navy.  The  people  of  New  Zealand  like  the 
Maoris  now,  and  they  get  on  very  well  together.  The 
population  has  grown  steadily,  and  New  Zealand  is  now  a 
rich,  prosperous  country,  well  governed  and  in  peace. 


CHAPTER   XLIII 

THE   FRENCH    REVOLUTION 

A  FEW  years  after  the  French  had  helped  the  United 
States  of  America  to  win  their  independence,  the  French 
nation  itself  began  a  great  struggle  for  freedom.  This 
struggle  is  the  most  important  thing  which  has  happened  in 
modern  times.  It  is  called  the  French  Revolution.  All 
through  the  eighteenth  century  France  was  becoming  more 
and  more  in  need  of  money.  The  wars  of  Louis  xiv.  had  cost 
the  nation  a  great  deal ;  still  Louis  had  left  his  country  great. 

But  his  great-grandson,  Louis  xv.,  who  ruled  after  him, 
was  very  different.  He  lived  a  very  bad  life,  and  under  him 
the  French  wars  resulted  only  in  losses.  As  we  have  seen, 
France  lost  India  and  Canada.  The  nation  grew  more  and 
more  dissatisfied.  The  people  had  not  complained  of  having 
an  absolute  king  when  he  had  led  them  to  victory,  but  now 
things  were  different.  In  some  parts  of  France  the  peasants 
were  very  poor,  though  there  were  very  few  who  were  not 
free. 

It  is  often  said  that  it  was  the  terrible  poverty  of  the 
peasants  which  brought  about  the  French  Revolution,  but 
this  is  not  true.  The  peasants  in  many  of  the  German  states 
in  Poland  and  in  Russia  were  in  a  far  worse  state,  for  in  those 
countries  they  were  still  serfs  like  the  peasants  in  England  in 
the  early  Middle  Ages.  They  could  not  leave  their  villages  or 
marry  unless  their  lords  allowed  them  to,  and  they  still  had 
to  work  several  days  each  week  on  their  lords'  lands  as  in  the 
early  days  of  feudalism.  Still,  though  the  French  peasants 
were  free  they  were  poor. 


THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION  457 

The  French  people  had  to  pay  great  taxes  at  this  time, 
and  it  made  many  of  them  very  angry  that  the  nobles  had 
not  to  pay  any  at  all.  There  was  a  large  middle  class  in 
France,  men  who  were  educated.  It  was  from  among  these 
that  the  leaders  of  the  Revolution  came. 

Louis  XV.  died  in  1774,  and  his  grandson,  Louis  xvi., 
who  was  only  twenty,  became  King  of  France.  He  had  been 
married  four  years  before  to  Marie  Antoinette,  a  beautiful 
young  princess,  and  the  youngest  of  the  sixteen  children  of 
Maria  Theresa.  The  Queen  was  a  year  younger  than  Louis. 
Louis  XVI.  was  quite  diiferent  from  his  grandfather.  He 
was  a  good  and  very  religious  man,  but  he  was  not  a  great 
king.  He  did  not  understand  the  troubles  of  France,  and 
was  not  strong  enough  in  character  to  face  the  difficulties 
of  his  position.  Marie  Antoinette  was  at  first  very  merry. 
She  seemed  to  the  French  people  who  saw  her  driving 
through  the  streets  of  Paris  heartless  and  vain.  But  she  was 
only  a  girl.  The  French  never  liked  her,  and  she  herself 
never  forgot  that  she  was  an  Austrian.  But  she  too  showed 
herself  very  brave,  and  she  was  always  a  good  woman. 

The  American  Revolution,  with  its  declaration  of  the 
*  rights  of  man,'  seemed  a  very  splendid  thing  to  many  of  the 
French.  Many  French  soldiers  and  officers  went  over  and 
helped  the  Americans  against  the  EngHsh.  Among  them 
was  a  young  French  nobleman,  the  Marquis  of  Lafayette, 
who  was  one  of  the  leaders  in  the  French  Revolution  after- 
wards. Men  like  these  thought  that  France  too  might  be- 
come happy,  and  free,  and  rich  again,  if  her  people  were 
allowed  power  in  the  government. 

The  old  French  parliament,  which  was  called  the  States- 
General,  had  not  met  for  one  hundred  and  seventy-five  years, 
when  Louis  xvi.  was  persuaded  to  let  it  meet  again  on  the 
1st  of  May  1789.  All  France  was  full  of  joy.  The  people 
thought  that  a  new  time  would  commence  when  France  had 
its  parliament  like  England  or  America.  They  forgot  that, 
even   when   nearly  two   hundred   years    before   the   States- 


458  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

General  had  been  called  by  French  kings,  it  had  had  very 
little  real  power.  All  over  France  the  people  were  busy 
electing  their  representatives. 

There  were  three  divisions  of  the  States-General :  the 
Nobles,  the  Clergy  or  Priests,  and  the  Tiers  ^tat,  or  Third 
Estate,  representing  the  people.  They  were  to  meet  at  the 
palace  of  Versailles,  and  on  the  day  they  assembled  the  six 
hundred  members  of  the  tiei^s  etat  walked  in  procession, 
dressed  in  black.  Behind  them  walked  the  nobles,  dressed  in 
bright-coloured  silks  and  velvets,  and  behind  them  again  the 
King  and  Queen,  with  the  people  of  their  court. 

The  people  cheered  the  third  estate,  and  were  silent  as  the 
nobles  passed,  for  it  was  from  the  third  estate,  the  represen- 
tatives of  the  people,  that  they  hoped  all  good  things  would 
come.  They  cheered  the  King  too,  but  grew  quiet  and  sullen 
again  as  the  Queen  passed.  But  she  made  no  sign,  only 
looking  up  to  the  balcony  where  her  eldest  boy,  the  little 
eight-year-old  Dauphin,  who  was  dying,  was  propped  up  to 
see  the  procession.  Before  a  month  was  over  the  little  boy 
was  dead,  and  his  younger  brother  was  now  the  Dauphin. 
Marie  Antoinette  shut  herself  up  for  a  day,  and  then  came 
bravely  out  again,  for  there  were  signs  of  trouble  in  this 
wonderful  new  French  parliament. 

The  King,  in  his  speech  at  the  first  meeting,  had  told 
the  States-General  that  they  must  decide  among  them- 
selves whether  the  three  'orders'  of  nobles,  clergy,  and 
the  tiers  etat  should  sit  together  as  one  house  or  meet  and 
vote  separately.  Every  one  knew  that  the  nobles  and  the 
higher  clergy  would  not  be  as  willing  to  make  great  changes 
in  the  government  as  the  tiers  etat  would  be.  It  would  mean 
that  the  two  votes  of  nobles  and  clergy  would  make  the 
vote  of  the  tiers  dtat  useless.  So  the  tiers  etat  declared  that 
the  three  *  orders  '  must  vote  together.  Some  of  the  clergy 
joined  them,  but  the  nobles  would  not. 

Then  the  tiers  etat,  with  the  clergy  who  had  joined  them, 
declared  that  they  were  the  representatives  of  the  nation,  and 


THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION  459 

gave  themselves  the  new  name  of  the  'National  Assembly.' 
They  said  that  the  nobles  could  join  them  if  they  liked,  and 
the  King  could  give  his  consent  if  he  liked,  but  that  it  really 
didn't  matter. 

The  Queen  advised  the  King  to  resist,  and  an  order  was 
given  that  the  hall  in  which  the  Assembly  had  been  meeting 
should  be  closed,  and  that  there  should  be  no  more  meetings 
until  a  day  when  the  King  was  to  be  present.  When  the 
Assembly  found  the  door  of  the  hall  closed  they  refused  to 
break  up,  but  held  their  meeting  in  a  tennis-court  near  by. 
Here  they  took  the  famous  oath  that  they  would  never 
separate  until  they  had  given  France  a  constitution,  by 
which  they  meant  a  government  in  which  the  people  had 
some  part. 

Louis  tried  to  insist  that  the  orders  should  vote  separately, 
but  it  was  no  use.  At  Versailles  and  at  Paris  the  people  were 
growing  angry,  and  the  King  had  to  give  way.  In  Paris 
bread  was  dear,  and  there  were  many  strangers  in  the  city. 
The  feeling  of  disorder  spread,  and  the  common  people  in  the 
streets  became  very  rough  and  violent.  There  were  many 
men  of  the  middle  class  in  Paris,  like  the  lawyer  Danton, 
who  were  anxious  to  get  rid  of  the  King  and  make  changes 
which  the  Assembly  had  not  yet  thought  of. 

Three  hundred  men  had  been  chosen  to  select  the  repre- 
sentatives of  the  people  of  Paris  in  the  States-General. 
These  three  hundred  now  made  themselves  the  rulers  of 
Paris.  They  began  to  collect  soldiers  to  guard  the  city. 
Many  of  the  roughest  people  joined  this  guard,  which  really 
became  an  army  ready  to  fight  the  King.  It  was  called  the 
National  Guard.  The  Hotel  des  Invalides,  the  home  of  the 
old  soldiers,  was  attacked  and  guns  and  powder  carried  off. 
Then  the  old  prison  of  the  Bastille  was  attacked.  Here  was 
a  great  quantity  of  powder,  and  only  the  Governor  and  a 
few  men  to  defend  it.  In  a  few  hours  they  gave  up  the 
prison,  but  were  killed  as  they  marched  out. 

The    news   of    the  taking   of    the    Bastille    spread   over 


460 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


Europe,  and  people  understood  that  this  was  a  real  revolu- 
tion. Marie  Antoinette  begged  the  King  to  flee  away  from 
France  with  her  and  her  children  until  this  dreadful  time 

should  be  over,  but  other 
people  advised  him  to  stay. 
But  many  French  nobles  fled 
from  France  to  safety,  the 
first  of  many  '  emigres '  who 
were  to  follow  them  in  the 
next  few  years.  The  excite- 
ment spread  all  over  France. 
In  many  of  the  country  dis- 
tricts the  peasants  rose,  mur- 
dered the  '  seigneurs '  or  lords 
of  the  land,  or  drove  them 
away  from  their  castles.  They 
took  the  land  for  themselves, 
and  much  of  the  beautiful 
furniture  in  the  [castles  was 
destroyed. 

Louis  made  up  his  mind 
to  go  to  Paris,  and  did  so. 
Lafayette  rode  before  him  on 
a  white  horse,  and  all  along 
the  road  the  people  shouted, 
'Long  live  the  Nation.'  It 
was  only  when  the  King,  pale 

(From  an  engraving  made  the  day  after  the  mob  and  aUXioUS,  StUCk  thc  nCW 
invaded  the  Tnileries  and  forced  the  King  to  put  coloUrS  of  tllC  RcVOlutioU,  red, 
on  the  tricolour  bonnet  and  to  drink  to  the  health 

of  the  nation).  whitc,    and   bluc,   iu   his    hat 

that  they  shouted,  '  Long  live 
the  King.'  Then  Louis  went  back  to  Versailles,  where  the 
Queen  was  weeping  and  praying  for  his  safety. 

But  it  was  not  long  before  the  King  was  back  in  Paris 
again.  A  terrible  mob  of  people  poured  out  from  the  city  to 
Versailles.     Lafayette  followed  them  with   some   soldiers  of 


LOUIS    XVI. 


WEARING    THE    REVOLUTIONARY 

BONNET 


THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION  461 

the  National  Guard.  The  mob  broke  into  the  palace,  and 
even  into  the  Queen's  room,  but  she  had  fled  to  her 
husband's.  Lafayette  drove  the  mob  from  the  palace,  but 
still  they  shrieked  and  howled  to  see  the  King,  and  Louis 
stepped  out  on  a  balcony  for  all  to  see. 

Then  louder  cries  came  for  the  Queen,  and  she  stepped 
out  with  her  children,  the  only  two  left  to  her,  her  daughter 
and  the  six-year-old  Dauphin.  But  the  crowd  cried  angrily 
that  they  did  not  want  any  children,  and  the  Queen  signed 
to  them  to  go  back  from  the  balcony.  She  stood  there 
looking  bravely  down  at  the  crowd.  One  man  pointed  a 
gun  towards  her,  but  did  not  fire. 

Lafayette  stepped  out  on  the  balcony  and  kissed  her 
hand.  He  was  very  sad  now,  for  the  Revolution,  from  which 
he  had  hoped  so  much,  was  becoming  a  very  different  thing 
from  what  he  had  expected.  The  angry  mob  still  shrieked 
that  their  king  should  go  to  Paris,  and  the  royal  family  was 
led  by  the  crowd  to  the  palace  of  the  Tuileries,  where  they 
lived  for  the  next  two  years,  the  Queen  always  with  her 
children,  frightened  to  go  beyond  the  gardens  of  the  palace, 
the  King  listening  to  information  about  the  doings  of  the 
Assembly,  giving  his  consent  to  what  he  could,  refusing 
when  his  conscience  told  him  a  thing  was  wrong. 

The  Assembly  upset  all  the  old  arrangements  in  France. 
They  did  away  with  the  old  '  provinces,'  and  divided  the 
country  up  into  districts.  Committees  were  sent  out  to  rule 
these,  but  all  were  under  the  Assembly.  But  there  was  so 
much  disorder  that  the  taxes  could  not  be  collected.  The 
Assembly  was  in  great  need  of  money.  There  were  many 
men  in  it  who  did  not  believe  in  any  religion  at  all,  and  they 
thought  it  would  be  an  excellent  plan  to  take  the  property  of 
the  Church  for  themselves.  They  did  so,  and  the  clergy  were 
then  paid  wages  by  the  state.  At  the  same  time  they  said 
that  the  French  Church  should  no  longer  be  under  the  Pope. 

To  these  things  Louis  could  not  agree.  At  last,  in  despair, 
he  agreed  with  the  Queen  that  the  best  thing  to  do  would  be 


462  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

to  try  to  escape.  Count  Fersen,  who  was  a  great  friend  of  the 
Queen's,  brought  them  clothes  to  disguise  themselves.  The 
King  was  to  be  dressed  plainly  like  a  man-servant,  and  the 
Queen  as  a  governess  travelling  with  the  two  children.  The 
Dauphin  was  put  into  girl's  clothes,  and  his  sister,  who  was 
the  only  one  of  the  family  who  lived  through  the  Revolution, 
said  that  he  looked  beautiful. 

They  stole  quietly  out  at  ten  o'clock  one  night  to  where  a 
coach  was  waiting  for  them.  Count  Fersen  was  the  coach- 
man. Outside  Paris  another  coach  waited  for  them  with  a 
German  coachman,  but  things  went  wrong.  The  horses  fell 
down  and  it  took  an  hour  to  mend  the  harness.  They  missed 
a  third  carriage  which  was  to  meet  them,  and  then  a  man 
named  Drouet  recognized  the  King.  The  coach  rolled  on, 
but  Drouet  and  an  innkeeper  took  horses  and  raced  it  to 
Varennes.  There  the  royal  family  was  stopped,  just  as  they 
were  practically  saved.  The  next  day  they  were  taken  back 
to  the  Tuileries  again. 

The  King  was  *  suspended '  for  a  time,  that  is,  the 
Assembly  said  he  should  not  have  the  position  of  king,  but 
in  a  short  time  he  was  recognized  as  king  once  more.  He 
gave  his  consent  to  the  '  Constitution,'  which  left  him  very 
little  power,  and  then  the  National  Assembly,  having  done  its 
work,  broke  up.  But  things  in  France  were  now  in  hopeless 
disorder.  A  new  parliament  was  to  meet,  to  which  none  of 
the  members  of  the  Assembly  were  to  belong.  New  men 
with  no  experience  were  to  rule  the  country. 

The  King  and  Queen  were  always  hoping  that  the 
Emperor  of  Austria  and  the  other  kings  of  Europe  would 
come  to  help  them.  They  only  agreed  to  the  laws  which 
were  passed,  thinking  that  in  a  short  time  foreign  armies 
would  come  and  free  them,  and  all  would  be  as  it  had  been 
before  in  France.  At  last  the  armies  did  march  towards 
France,  the  armies  of  Austria  and  Prussia.  Leopold,  the 
Emperor,  was  the  brother  of  Marie  Antoinette.  Maria 
Theresa  was  now  dead.     But  Leopold  died  just  at  this  time, 


THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION  463 

and  his  son  was  not  so  well  able  to  help  his  aunt.  Still,  after 
long  delays,  his  army  came. 

The  King  of  Prussia  sent  an  army,  for  he  felt  that 
these  new  things  which  the  French  were  preaching  every- 
where were  dangerous  for  every  king  in  Europe.  The 
French  knew  that  the  King  and  Queen  were  writing  to 
the  other  countries  of  Europe  to  help  them,  and  the 
leaders  of  the  Revolution  grew  more  and  more  angry,  as 
did  also  the  Paris  mob.  It  was  the  French  themselves  who 
declared  war  at  last.  All  the  soldiers  who  could  be  gathered 
together  were  sent  off  to  the  borders  of  France  and  the 
Netherlands,  and  the  roughest  men  in  Paris  were  allowed  to 
join  the  National  Guard. 

Before  this  the  Paris  mob  had  broken  into  the  Tuileries. 
They  had  stood  joking  roughly  in  the  very  presence  of  the 
King  and  Queen,  and  stuck  a  red  cap  of  liberty  on  the 
head  of  the  little  Dauphin.  In  the  end  they  had  gone  away 
without  doing  any  harm.  Many  people  all  over  France 
were  now  sorry  for  the  King  and  Queen,  and  kind  messages 
poured  in  upon  them.  But  once  the  war  commenced  the 
most  violent  of  the  people  and  the  leaders  had  things  all 
their  own  way.  Again  the  mob  attacked  the  Tuileries,  and 
the  King  and  Queen,  with  their  children  and  the  King's  sister, 
fled  for  safety  to  the  hall  where  the  Assembly  had  its  meetings. 

Day  after  day  they  had  to  be  crowded  together  in  a  small 
joom  used  by  newspaper  reporters,  and  there  they  could  hear 
the  parliament  discussing  what  should  be  done  with  them. 
At  last  they  were  carried  off  to  a  prison  in  a  building  called 
'  the  Temple  '  in  Paris.  They  lived  here  in  small  rooms,  very 
different  from  those  to  which  they  had  been  used.  At  first 
a  few  friends  were  allowed  to  stay  with  them,  but  later  these 
were  all  sent  away.  Madame  de  Lamballe,  a  great  friend  of 
the  Queen,  was  driven  from  the  Temple  into  another  prison. 
By  this  time  nearly  all  the  nobles  and  friends  of  the  King 
who  had  not  escaped  from  France  had  been  shut  up  in  prison. 

In  the  '  Convention,'  as  the  new  parliament  was  called,  the 


464  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

most  violent  of  the  revolutionaries  under  Marat,  a  madman 
whose  one  idea  was  a  republic  in  which  all  the  people  should 
have  equal  power,  ordered  that  the  friends  of  the  King  in 
prison  should  be  killed.  A  band  of  two  hundred  men  went 
from  prison  to  prison  and  murdered  them.  There  was  only 
one  woman  killed  in  these  dreadful  '  September  Massacres  '  as 
they  were  called.  It  was  Marie  Antoinette's  friend,  the 
Princesse  de  Lamballe.  As  Louis  xvi.  stood  staring  out  of 
the  window  of  his  prison,  suddenly  the  head  of  his  wife's  friend 
was  held  up  on  a  spear  before  his  eyes.  The  King's  first 
thought  was  to  prevent  the  Queen  from  seeing  it,  but  she 
had  seen  it  and  fainted  away.  ^ 

The  Execution  of  the  King 

A  week  or  two  later  the  Convention  declared  that  France 
was  a  republic.  For  the  future  they  spoke  of  Louis  xvi.  as 
Louis  Capet.  He  was  ^  citizen  '  like  any  other.  Then  three 
months  later  Louis  was  brought  to  trial  as  a  'public  enemy.' 
He  was  found  guilty.  Three  hundred  and  sixty-one  members 
voted  for  his  death,  and  three  hundred  and  sixty  against  it. 
He  was  condemned  to  die.  Already  he  had  been  separated 
from  the  Queen  and  his  children,  but  they  were  allowed  to 
see  him  the  night  before  he  died.  He  was  very  brave  and 
quite  gentle.  He  made  the  little  Dauphin  promise  never  to 
take  revenge  for  his  death,  and  then  he  sent  them  away  and 
gave  his  last  hours  to  preparation  for  death.  The  next 
morning  he  was  beheaded  in  a  public  square  in  Paris,  assuring 
the  great  crowds  who  were  gathered  round  that  he  '  died 
innocent.' 

Meanwhile  the  Prussians  and  Austrians,  who  had  thought 
that  they  had  nothing  to  do  but  march  on  Paris,  had  not  been 
very  successful.  They  had  started  too  late  in  the  season  ; 
the  weather  was  bad  and  their  men  fell  sick.  When  the  two 
armies  at  last  fought  at  Valmy  they  found  that  the  French 
soldiers  could  not  be  driven  back,  and  in  a  few  days  they 
marched  out  of  France  again. 


THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION  465 

Then  the  French  leaders  at  Paris  were  full  of  joy.  They 
made  up  their  minds  to  help  all  the  peoples  of  Europe  to  set 
up  republics  too.  Their  armies  overran  Belgium  and  joined 
it  to  France.  Another  army  did  the  same  in  Savoy,  on  the 
borders  of  France  and  Italy,  and  another  conquered  the 
German  states  on  the  Rhine.  They  then  declared  that  they 
would  attack  England  and  help  the  English  republicans  to 
set  up  a  republic.  In  this  they  were  quite  mistaken,  for  no 
one  in  England  wanted  a  republic.  Then  came  the  execution 
of  the  King. 

Soon  France  was  standing  alone  against  Europe.  England, 
Holland,  Spain,  Austria,  and  Prussia  were  at  war  with  her. 
The  people  in  the  south  and  west  of  France  rose  in  rebellion. 
In  La  Vendee*,  a  district  in  the  west  of  France  and  running 
along  the  coast  south  of  the  river  Loire,  the  peasants  rose 
to  defend  their  seigneurs  and  their  religion.  They  nearly 
drove  the  republicans  out  of  the  district,  but  now  the 
'Jacobins,'  the  worst  revolutionaries  of  all,  got  power,  and 
what  is  known  as  the  '  Reign  of  Terror '  began. 

Every  one  who  was  suspected  of  being  against  the 
Revolution  was  brought  up  before  judges  appointed  for  the 
purpose.  There  was  no  real  trial.  Practically  every  one 
suspected  was  put  to  death.  Some  were  nobles  but  others 
were  mere  peasants.  Even  girls  and  little  children  and 
old  people  were  put  to  death.  In  La  Vendee  the  revolt 
was  put  down,  and  people  were  killed  in  hundreds  for  being 
faithful  to  their  lords  and  their  Church. 

It  took  too  long  even  to  behead  them  all  with  the  guillotine, 
the  great  new  knife  machine  which  had  been  invented  during 
the  Revolution,  and  so  hundreds  were  thrown  into  the  river 
to  drown.  Men  who  were  violent,  but  not  violent  enough, 
were  seized  and  condemned  to  death  in  their  turn.  Madame 
Roland,  the  wife  of  one  of  the  leaders,  had  exclaimed  when 
she  was  led  out  to  die,  '  O  Liberty,  what  crimes  are  com- 
mitted in  thy  name.'  For  in  the  end  she  too  was  guillotined. 
But  the  Queen's  turn  had  come  before  this.     Her  children 

2  G 


466 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


had  been  taken  from  her  in  prison,  and  she  too  was  tried  and 
condemned  to  death.  She  was  old  and  white  before  her 
time,  and  blind  in  one  eye  through  the  cold  and  damp  of 
her  last  prison.  For  her  last  days  were  spent  not  even  in 
the  Temple,  but  in  the  common  prison. 

From  there  she  was  drawn,  sitting  on  a  cart,  with  her  hands 
tied,  to  be  guillotined  before  the  Paris  mob.     Her  little  boy 


^ 


-—  Si, 


i!  >-.'.. ••■■•'11-  ^ 


i'  i  ii 


zis^. 


U.}^ 


THE    YOUNG    OFFICER    NAPOLEON    PUTS    AN    END    TO    THE    REVOLUTION 

The  famous  '  whiff  of  grapeshot,'  when  Napoleon  in  1799  cleared  the  streets  of  Paris  of 
insurrectionists,  and  thereafter  made  himself  First  Consul  of  France. 


died  in  prison  after  being  treated  with  the  greatest  cruelty ,^ 
but  her  daughter  was  at  last  sent  to  her  mother's  relations  in 
Austria.  A  girl  from  Normandy,  called  Charlotte  Corday, 
travelled  up  from  the  country  to  Paris,  and  stabbed  Marat  to 
the  heart  for  his  cruelty.  She  was  killed  in  her  turn.  Danton 
and  Robespierre,  great  leaders  of  the  Revolution,  were  killed 
too. 

At  last  the  Reign  of  Terror  came  to  an  end.  France  was 
winning  victories  on  all  her  boundaries.  Now  that  Robespierre 
was  gone,  the  people  all  over  France  asked  for  a  complete 


THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION  467 

change  of  government.  They  turned  against  the  Jacobins  who 
were  left,  and  many  of  these  were  massacred  in  their  turn. 
After  a  time  in  which  religion  had  been  attacked  so  cruelly, 
the  people  were  now  again  crowding  to  the  churches.  Many 
of  the  emigres  came  back  to  France.  It  was  thought  even 
that  the  little  Dauphin,  who  was  still  alive  in  prison,  might 
be  made  king,  but  this  was  not  to  be. 

At  last  a  new  constitution  was  set  up.  It  consisted  of 
two  houses  of  parliament,  and  at  the  head  five  men  called  the 
Directors.  But  in  the  lower  house  of  the  new  parliament 
many  of  the  Jacobins  were  to  sit  again.  There  was  a  great 
deal  of  disorder  at  the  elections,  and  a  young  officer  called 
Napoleon  Bonaparte  was  called  in  by  Barras,  the  head  of  the 
government,  to  put  down  an  insurrection.  In  this  way  this 
young  officer  became  important.  We  shall  see  what  a  great 
part  he  played  in  the  history  of  France  and  the  world  in  the 
next  twenty  years. 


CHAPTER    XLIV 

THE  STORY  OF  NAPOLEON 

Napoleon  Bonaparte  was  born  of  a  good  family  in  the 
island  of  Corsica,  in  the  year  1769,  the  year  after  Maria 
Antoinette  was  married  to  Louis  xvi.  of  France.  Corsica 
had  for  many  years  been  fighting  for  its  independence  against 
Genoa,  but  had  at  last  been  sold  by  that  state  to  France.  So 
Napoleon  Bonaparte,  though  he  was  Italian  by  birth,  was  a 
subject  of  the  French  king.  When  he  was  a  boy  he  was 
fond  of  playing  with  a  drum  and  sword,  and  his  father  made 
up  his  mind  that  he  should  be  a  soldier.  When  he  was  ten 
years  old  he  was  sent  to  France  to  be  trained  at  schools  for 
boys  intending  to  join  the  army,  and  he  became  a  lieutenant 
in  an  artillery  regiment  when  he  was  sixteen. 

When  the  Revolution  broke  out.  Napoleon,  although  he 
had  never  been  very  fond  of  France  because  of  its  conquest 
of  Corsica,  was  filled  with  enthusiasm  for  it.  Corsica  sent 
representatives  to  the  tiers  etat,  and  all  the  reforms  which 
were  made  in  France  were  carried  out  in  Corsica  too.  In  the 
first  years  after  the  beginning  of  the  Revolution,  Napoleon 
Bonaparte  lived  quietly  in  lodgings  at  Auxonne,  where  his 
regiment  was  stationed,  and  did  all  he  could  to  educate  his 
young  brother  Louis,  who  lived  with  him.  Their  father  was 
by  this  time  dead,  and  Napoleon  was  looked  upon  as  the 
head  of  his  family,  although  he  was  only  the  second  son. 

The  other  officers  in  his  regiment  were  royalists,  and 
Napoleon  was  very  lonely,  for  he  could  not  mix  freely  with 
them.  He  had  always  been  fond  of  history,  and  he  read  now 
all  he  could  find,  being  especially  fond  of  Julius  Caesar's  own 


THE  STORY  OF  NAPOLEON  469 

account  of  his  wars  in  Gaul.  He  had  to  take  his  sister 
home  to  Corsica  when  the  convent  at  which  she  was  a 
pupil  was  broken  up  by  the  revolutionaries  as  so  many 
convents  and  monasteries  were.  But  it  was  not  long  before 
all  the  Bonapartes  had  to  leave  Corsica,  for  Paoli,  the  chief 
man  in  the  island,  turned  against  France  after  the  death 
of  the  king,  and  joined  himself  with  England  to  fight  against 
France.    The  Bonapartes  went  to  France. 

Napoleon  had  a  better  chance  of  rising  quickly  as  an  officer, 
because  the  army  was  in  great  need  of  good  officers,  through 
the  loss  of  so  many  royalists.  He  first  won  great  praise  for 
himself  by  the  way  in  which  he  helped  in  the  attack  on 
the  royalists  at  Toulon  in  1793.  They  had  let  British  and 
Spanish  soldiers  into  the  town,  and  the  republicans  were 
afraid  that  more  and  more  might  come,  and  that  a  great  attack 
might  be  made  on  France  from  this  port.  The  first  officers 
sent  against  Toulon  did  very  little  good.  One  of  them  was 
an  artist  and  knew  nothing  about  fighting.  It  was  Napoleon 
who  pointed  out  the  weak  side  of  the  town,  where  the  attack 
could  be  made.  The  town  was  conquered,  and  an  English 
invasion  of  France  by  way  of  Toulon  was  now  impossible. 

After  this  Napoleon  helped  a  great  deal  in  fortifying 
places  along  the  coast  of  France.  He  still  spent  all  his 
spare  time  in  studying  the  science  of  war.  The  help  which 
he  gave  the  Directory  in  putting  down  the  insurrection  in 
Paris  in  1795  made  him  great.  He  had  fallen  in  love  with 
Josephine  de  Beauharnais,  the  widow  of  a  French  noble  who 
had  been  executed  during  the  Revolution.  Josephine  was 
very  lively  and  beautiful,  and  one  of  the  greatest  women  in 
France  at  the  time.  She  was  a  friend  of  Barras,  the  chief 
man  in  the  Directory,  and  he  persuaded  her  to  marry 
Napoleon.  She  was  six  years  older  than  Napoleon  and  did 
not  care  much  for  the  thin,  pale-faced  officer,  but  she  at 
last  agreed  to  marry  him,  though  she  would  not  go  with  him 
two  days  after  the  marriage  to  Italy,  where  he  had  got  the 
command  of  the  French  army. 


470  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

The  attack  on  Italy  was  part  of  the  war  against  Austria, 
to  whom  most  of  the  north  of  Italy  belonged.  Two  other 
armies  were  to  march  through  Germany  and  attack  Vienna. 
Napoleon  was  only  one  of  the  generals  of  the  republic,  but 
he  knew  that  he  was  the  best  soldier  of  his  time,  and  he  had 
already  made  up  his  mind  to  imitate  Julius  Cassar  and  to 
make  himself  dictator  of  France,  and  of  as  much  of  Europe 
as  he  could  win.  It  was  a  wonderful  plan  for  this  young 
Corsican  officer  even  to  think  of,  and  more  wonderful  still  is 
the  fact  that  he  nearly  carried  it  out,  and  that  for  years  he 
kept  all  Europe  struggling  to  overthrow  his  power. 

The  Emperor  of  Austria  had  the  King  of  Sardinia  to  help 
him  in  the  north  of  Italy,  but  Napoleon  always  tried  to  keep 
his  enemy  split  up,  and  prevented  the  army  of  Piedmont, 
which  was  under  the  rule  of  the  King  of  Sardinia,  from 
joining  the  Austrian  army,  and  soon  the  King  of  Sardinia 
made  his  peace  with  Napoleon,  giving  Piedmont  up  to 
France. 

Napoleon  then  easily  conquered  the  Austrians,  and  took 
the  north  of  Italy.  He  made  the  people  pay  him  money,  and 
he  chose  some  of  the  most  beautiful  of  the  art  treasures  of 
Italy  to  send  back  to  France.  Before  this  Prussia  and  Spain 
had  been  frightened  into  making  peace  with  France,  and 
Spain  and  Holland  were  even  helping  that  country  at  this 
time;  but  England  was  still  the  greatest  power  on  the  sea, 
and  victories  were  won  over  both  the  Spanish  and  Dutch 
fleets.  Now,  in  1797,  Austria  made  peace,  and  agreed  to 
give  up  the  north  of  Italy  to  France. 

The  Great  Lord  Nelson 

England  was  now  left  alone  to  fight  the  French.  When 
Napoleon  got  back  to  Paris  it  was  quite  plain  that  he  could 
do  just  what  he  liked.  But  he  did  not  have  himself  made 
dictator  yet.  He  pretended  that  he  was  going  to  invade 
England,  but  he  really  intended  to  sail  to  Egypt,  conquer 


THE  STORY  OF  NAPOLEON  471 

it  and  Syria,  and  from  there  perhaps  win  both  India  and 
Europe.  When  Napoleon  sailed  off  to  the  East,  part  of  the 
British  fleet  under  Sir  Horatio  Nelson  followed  it. 

Nelson  was  soon  to  show  himself  the  greatest  of  English 
seamen.  He  was  a  small,  delicate-looking  man,  but  he  was  a 
splendid  sailor  and  soldier,  and  had  been  at  sea  since  he  was 
twelve  years  old.  A  story  is  told  of  him  that,  when  he  was 
still  a  young  midshipman,  he  was  on  a  ship  which  sailed  into 
the  ice-bound  seas  near  the  North  Pole.  He  and  another  boy 
stole  away  one  night  to  see  if  they  could  find  and  shoot  a 
bear.  A  fog  came  on,  and  the  captain  was  very  anxious 
when  he  knew  that  the  boys  were  missing,  but  when  the  fog 
melted  away  he  saw  them  far  off,  ready  to  attack  a  bear. 

The  captain  called  to  them  to  come  back  to  the  ship,  and 
the  other  boy  did  so,  but  Nelson  cried  out,  begging  the 
captain  to  let  him  have  just  one  blow  at  the  bear.  But 
the  captain  had  a  shot  fired  which  frightened  the  bear  away. 
When  Nelson  got  back  to  the  ship  the  captain  scolded  him, 
but  he  said  sorrowfully,  '  I  wanted  to  kill  the  bear  and  take 
its  skin  home  to  my  father.'  Horatio  Nelson  never  knew 
what  it  was  to  be  afraid. 

When  the  fleet  under  Nelson  came  up  with  the  French 
fleet  they  were  anchored  in  the  Bay  of  Aboukir,  close  to  the 
shore  of  Egypt.  Napoleon  was  already  fighting  on  the  land, 
and  winning  Egypt  from  the  Mamelukes.  Nelson  ordered 
five  of  his  ships  to  sail  in  between  the  French  ships  and  the 
shore,  *  for,'  he  said,  '  where  the  French  ships  had  room  to 
swing  the  English  had  room  to  anchor.'  In  this  way  the 
French  ships  were  caught  between  two  fires. 

The  battle  began  at  sunset  and  went  on  all  night.  By 
morning  eleven  of  the  thirteen  French  ships  had  been 
destroyed  or  taken.  The  French  Admiral's  flagship  had 
blown  up  and  the  Admiral  himself  had  been  killed.  It 
was  on  this  ship  that  the  ten-year-old  boy,  Casabianca,  died 
standing  at  his  post  on  the  burning  ship  until  his  father 
should  give  him  leave  to  go.     His  father  was  already  dead, 


472  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

though  Casabianca  did  not  know  it,  and  the  brave  boy  died 
too. 

Nelson  was  wounded  in  the  forehead,  but  he  had  won 
the  great  Battle  of  the  Nile.  After  this  no  other  fleet 
had  any  chance  against  the  English  in  the  Mediterranean. 
Meanwhile  Napoleon  went  on  from  Egypt  to  Syria,  which 
he  meant  to  win  from  Turkey,  but  he  could  not  take  Acre, 
which  the  English  officer,  Sir  Sidney  Smith,  helped  to 
defend. 

Then  suddenly  Napoleon  slipped  back  to  France  in  a 
fast  sailing  ship.  He  was  much  needed  there,  for  trouble 
was  threatening  the  Directors  from  all  sides.  Napoleon  was 
greeted  with  joy  as  the  conqueror  of  Egypt.  He  was  wise 
enough  not  to  say  much  about  Syria. 

When  Napoleon  had  left  France,  England  was  the  only 
country  at  war  with  the  Republic,  but  he  came  back  to 
find  that  a  new  '  coalition '  had  now  been  formed  against  her. 
England  of  course  was  in  it,  for  it  was  England  from  the  first 
who  was  most  determined  to  resist  the  attacks  of  France  on 
the  lands  of  Europe.  Russia  and  Austria  were  the  other 
chief  members  of  the  coalition. 

While  Napoleon  was  away  the  Directory  had  been  in  great 
need  of  money,  and  they  had  actually  sent  an  army  to  attack 
Rome,  where  there  were  a  few  republicans.  The  old  Pope, 
Pius  VI.,  was  a  very  good  and  gentle  man  and  Rome  had  been 
quite  happy  under  him,  far  happier  than  it  was  now  when  the 
French  turned  it  into  a  republic,  and  then  took  as  much 
money  and  as  many  of  its  art  treasures  as  they  could  get. 
The  people  of  Europe  were  horrified  to  hear  that  the  Pope 
had  even  been  roughly  treated,  his  staff  dragged  from  his 
hand  and  his  ring  from  his  finger.  He  was  carried  off  to 
Siena,  and  then  to  Valence  in  France,  where  he  stayed  till  he 
died.     The  French  soon  made  themselves  hated  in  Rome. 

For  the  same  reason  they  set  up  a  united  republic  in 
Switzerland,  calling  it  the  Helvetian  Republic.  The  cantons, 
as  the  divisions  of  Switzerland  were  called,  were  each  used  to 


THE  STORY  OF  NAPOLEON  473 

governing  themselves,  and  did  not  want  this  new  form  of 
government.  The  kingdom  of  Naples,  whose  queen,  Marie 
Caroline,  was  a  sister  of  Marie  Antoinette,  was  also  turned 
into  a  republic,  though  here  again  very  few  of  the  people 
wished  for  this  change. 

When  the  coalition  began  to  fight,  the  French  were 
defeated  in  North  Italy  by  the  great  Russian  general 
Suvarov.  Suvarov  was  a  very  wonderful  general.  He 
never  dreamed  of  failure,  and  when  he  had  fought  and  won 
a  battle  he  always  still  had  strength  to  pursue  the  enemy 
as  they  fled.  His  men  took  the  same  courage  from  him. 
His  commands  before  a  battle  are  almost  amusing  from  the 
confident  way  they  would  begin  with  such  words  as :  '  The 
hostile  army  will  be  taken  prisoners.' 

The  King  and  Queen  of  Naples  were  given  back  their 
kingdom,  and  Nelson's  fleet  stood  by  to  defend  them.  In 
Switzerland  an  Austrian  officer  led  an  Austrian  and  Russian 
army  against  the  French,  but  could  not  drive  them  out. 
Still  things  were  going  very  badly  with  the  French  when 
Napoleon  got  back  from  Egypt.  The  people  were  quite 
tired  of  the  Directory.  The  Abbe  Sieyes,  a  priest,  who  had 
been  making  constitutions  ever  since  the  Revolution  began, 
had  another  one  ready  now. 

The  worst  of  '  paper '  constitutions — that  is,  constitutions 
which  are  drawn  up  out  of  a  man's  head  without  any 
experience  of  how  they  work — is  that  they  very  seldom  will 
work  at  all.  This  new  constitution  of  the  '  year  viii.,'  as  it 
was  called  (for  now  in  France  the  years  were  counted  from 
the  *  year  i.,'  the  first  year  of  the  destruction  of  the  monarchy 
and  the  setting  up  of  the  republic),  was  carefully  drawn  up 
so  that  power  was  divided  between  many  people,  and  nobody 
had  any  real  power  at  all. 

Napoleon  thought  it  would  be  a  very  good  constitution 
indeed  with  one  change.  At  the  head  of  all  the  other  parts 
of  the  constitution  there  should  be  a  '  First  Consul,'  and 
he  should   be    Napoleon   himself     Napoleon   had  his  great 


474  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

army  behind  him,  ready  to  fight  for  him  to  a  man,  and  the 
French  people  had  no  chance  to  say  '  No,'  even  if  they  had 
wished.  But  they  were  tired  of  disorder,  and  were  only  too 
glad  to  have  a  strong  man  to  govern  them.  For  the  '  First 
Consul '  was  just  as  absolute  as  any  king  of  France  had  ever 
been.  Four  years  afterwards  he  was  given  the  name  of 
Emperor,  but  he  was  the  all-powerful  ruler  of  France  from 
the  moment  he  became  First  Consul  at  the  end  of  the  year 
1799. 

The  few  serfs  who  were  still  remaining  in  France  at  the 
Revolution  became  free.  The  property  which  had  been  taken 
from  the  Church  and  given  to  other  people  was  not  given 
back,  but  the  churches  which  had  not  been  given  away  were. 
Peace  was  made  with  the  Pope,  and  the  Catholic  religion  was 
made  the  religion  of  the  state  again,  but  the  priests  were  to 
be  servants  of  the  state  and  paid  by  the  government,  as  they 
are  still  in  France  to-day. 

So  many  changes  which  the  Revolution  had  made  re- 
mained, but  there  was  no  real  democracy  or  self-government, 
which  was  what  the  republicans  had  fought  so  hard  for. 
Each  district  in  France  was  governed  by  men  chosen  by 
Napoleon,  so  that  he  had  the  whole  government  of  the 
country  in  his  hands,  just  as  much  as  Louis  xiv.  had  had. 
The  people  were  not  more  free  under  Napoleon  in  many 
ways  than  they  had  been  before. 

The  freedom  of  the  press,  which  the  revolutionaries  had 
given,  by  which  any  man  could  publish  any  book  he  liked, 
was  now  stopped.  Every  book  had  to  have  the  consent  of 
people  appointed  by  the  Emperor.  Then,  too,  Napoleon 
could  imprison  or  send  any  one  out  of  the  country  just  as 
he  liked.  He  had  his  spies  everywhere  to  watch  the  people 
and  inform  him  if  any  one  was  dangerous  to  the  govern- 
ment. 

As  time  went  on  too.  Napoleon  became  more  and  more 
anxious  to  have  a  magnificent  court.  The  old  nobles  who 
were  willing  to  come  back  were  gladly  received,  for  Napoleon 


THE  STOKY  OF  NAPOLEON 


475 


liked  to  have  men  with  high-sounding  names  around  him. 
The  revolutionaries  had  said  there  should  be  no  new  titles, 
but  Napoleon  loved  to  make  men  dukes  for  their  services 
to  him,  and  so  a  new  nobility  grew  up  around  him. 

His  coronation  with  Josephine  in  1804  was  a  very 
gorgeous  affair.  Napoleon  had  persuaded  the  new  Pope, 
Pius  VII.,  to  go  to  Paris  for  the 
coronation,  but  when  the  moment 
came  he  preferred  to  put  the  crown 
on  his  head  himself.  Napoleon  was 
dressed  for  the  ceremony  in  a  red 
velvet  coat,  and  over  it  a  purple 
robe  of  velvet  trimmed  with  ermine, 
while  Josephine  knelt  beside  him 
in  white  satin  and  diamonds. 

llussia  had  by  this  time  made 
peace  with  Napoleon,  for  the  Tsar 
Paul  admired  him  very  much,  and 
had  only  really  been  led  to  de- 
clare war  against  France  because 
Napoleon  had  attacked  the  Turks, 
and  Russia  thought  that  the  western 
countries  of  Europe  should  leave 
the  east  alone,  and  that  if  any  one 
won  land  from  Turkey  it  should  be 
Russia  herself. 

So  now  Napoleon  had  England 
and  Austria  to  fight.  He  knew 
that    a   large    Austrian   army   was 

at  the  foot  of  the  Italian  side  of  the  Alps,  near  the  Mount 
St.  Bernard,  a  very  difficult  place.  But  he  led  his  men  across. 
It  was  a  very  difficult  march  with  cannons  and  baggage,  but 
Napoleon's  soldiers  could  do  almost  anything.  They  fought 
the  Austrians,  and  won  the  great  battle  of  Marengo.  In 
Germany  another  of  Napoleon's  generals  won  the  battle  of 
Hohenlinden,   and    now   Austria    too   made   peace,   leaving 


NAPOLEON    BONAPARTE 


(After  the  painting  by  Delaroche). 


476  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


leon  with  all  his  conquests.  And  so  once  more 
England  was  left  to  fight  France  alone. 

Russia  had  persuaded  Sweden,  Prussia,  and  Denmark,  all 
the  countries  with  ships  on  the  Baltic,  to  complain  of  the 
way  in  which  England  treated  their  ships.  England  had  for- 
bidden ships  of  countries  which  were  not  at  war  to  carry  things 
between  countries  which  were  at  war,  and  other  things  which 
were  quite  right.  For  if  England  had  not  forbidden  these 
things,  a  country  like  Sweden  could  have  helped  France  very 
much  against  her  without  declaring  war.  But  now  these 
countries  complained,  and  England  had  to  fight  them. 

A  fleet  was  sent  to  Denmark  under  Nelson,  but  over 
him  was  Sir  Hyde  Parker,  who  was  not  nearly  so  fine  a 
fighter  or  officer  as  Nelson.  He  sent  messages  to  the  Danes, 
hoping  to  be  able  to  make  an  agreement  without  fighting. 
This  made  Nelson  very  impatient.  But  the  Danes  were 
obstinate,  and  so  a  great  battle  was  fought  outside  the 
harbour  of  the  city  of  Copenhagen,  the  capital  of  Denmark. 
It  was  a  hard  fight,  and  in  the  middle  of  it  Sir  Hyde 
Parker,  fearing  that  the  English  would  be  defeated,  put  up  a 
signal:  'Cease  Action.'  Nelson  did  not  see  it  at  first,  and 
when  some  one  told  him  of  it,  he  put  a  telescope  to  his 
blind  eye  (for  he  had  lost  one  eye  and  an  arm  too  in  battle 
some  years  before),  and  said,  '  I  do  not  see  the  signal,'  and 
so  went  on  fighting. 

He  was  right,  for  the  English  won  a  great  victory.  The 
Danes  promised  to  give  up  their  fleet,  and  now  Napoleon 
had  no  more  hope  of  destroying  England's  power  on  the 
seas.  Soon  after,  the  Tsar  Paul  died,  and  his  son  Alexander 
became  king.  Though  Alexander  admired  Napoleon  too, 
he  was  much  under  the  influence  of  his  mother  and  her 
friends,  and  he  was  persuaded  to  give  up  the  friendship  with 
France.  So  England  had  her  way  after  all  about  the  ships 
of  the  countries  which  were  not  at  war. 

Just  at  this  point  the  younger  Pitt,  the  son  of  the  great 
Earl   of  Chatham,   gave    up   his   position   as    head   of   the 


THE  STORY  OF  NAPOLEON  477 

government  in  England.  It  was  he  who  had  been  so  deter- 
mined to  fight  the  French,  and  Napoleon  took  advantage 
of  his  absence  to  arrange  a  peace  with  England.  A  peace 
was  signed,  but  it  did  not  last  long.  Napoleon  never  meant 
it  to.  He  hated  England  with  a  bitter  hatred.  So  far  he  had 
been  able  to  conquer  the  old-fashioned  armies  of  the  European 
countries,  but  everywhere  the  English  had  won  by  sea. 

These  victories  of  the  English  were  partly  owing  to  the 
fact  that  the  English  were  a  real  nation,  while  the  feeling 
of  nationality  was  not  awake  yet  in  Europe,  except  perhaps 
in  France  itself.  The  armies  of  Austria  made  war  on 
Napoleon  because  their  Emperor  told  them  to,  but  they  had 
no  great  interest  in  the  battle.  Later  on,  when  the  peoples 
of  Europe  began  to  hate  Napoleon,  things  were  different. 

The  younger  Pitt  came  back  to  power  in  1804  and 
immediately  began  to  plan  another  coalition,  but  even  before 
this  Napoleon  was  building  a  great  fleet  of  fiat-bottomed 
boats,  in  which  he  hoped  to  carry  soldiers  across  to  England 
and  conquer  it.  He  knew  that  England  had  no  great  army 
to  meet  his,  but  already  Englishmen  everywhere  were  offering 
themselves  as  volunteers  and  drilling  hard,  so  as  to  be  able  to 
fight  the  French  when  they  came. 

Napoleon  ordered  Spain,  whose  weak  king,  Charles  iv., 
was  entirely  in  his  power,  to  build  a  fleet  too.  The  French 
and  Spanish  fleets  were  to  sail  to  the  West  Indies,  and 
Napoleon  hoped  that  the  greater  part  of  the  British  fleet 
would  follow  them.  Then  the  remaining  French  fleet  would 
easily  destroy  the  English  fleet  in  the  Channel,  and  land 
the  '  Army  of  England '  in  England.  But  things  went 
wrong.  The  English  fleet  watched  the  others  too  well, 
and  the  whole  plan  failed.  Meanwhile  Pitt  had  got  liis 
coalition,  when  Russia  and  Austria  joined  him  once  more 
in  war  against  Napoleon.  One  thing  which  made  the  other 
countries  very  angry  was  the  way  that  Napoleon  behaved 
when  in  1804  he  found  out  a  plot  to  kill  him  and  put  the 
uncle  of  Louis  xvi.  on  the  French  throne. 


478 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


This  uncle,  who  was  called  Louis  xviii.  by  the  Royalists, 
was  in  England,  and  Napoleon  could  not  get  at  him,  but 
he  ordered  French  soldiers  to  arrest  the  Duke  d'Enghien,  a 
young  prince  of  the  French  royal  family,  who  was  living  in 

one  of  the  German  states.  Napoleon 
had  no  right  to  arrest  a  prisoner  in  any 
other  country.  This  was  an  insult  in 
itself,  but  people  were  still  more  horri- 
fied to  hear  that  the  young  prince  had 
been  shot  by  order  of  Napoleon,  although 
he  had  not  had  anything  to  do  with  the 
plot. 

The  Death  of  Nelson 

In  October  1805  Napoleon,  seeing 
that  he  could  not  land  his  army  in  Eng- 
land, sent  it  across  Europe  to  fight  the 
Austrians  in  Bavaria.  It  won  a  great 
victory  at  Ulm,  but  two  days  after 
Nelson  won  another  victory  at  sea,  the 
victory  of  Trafalgar.  The  battle  of  Tra- 
falgar was  fought  off  the  Spanish  coast 
near  the  Cape  of  Trafalgar.  The  English 
under  Nelson  fought  the  united  fleets 
of  France  and  Spain.  The  ships  fought 
close  together  in  a  terrible  struggle, 
and  the  English  almost  completely 
destroyed  the  enemies'  fleets.  At  the 
beginning  of  the  fight  Nelson  ordered 
the  famous  signal  to  be  made  to  all  his 
ships,  '  England  expects  every  man  to  do  his  duty.'  But 
Nelson,  at  the  head  of  his  line  of  ships  on  his  own  ship  the 
Victory,  was  wounded  in  the  breast.  His  coat  was  covered 
with  medals,  which  he  had  refused  to  take  off  when  some 
one  suggested  that  the  enemy  would  recognize  him  through 


(After  the  painting  by  Hoppner) 


THE  STORY  OF  NAPOLEON  479 

them  and  shoot  specially  at  him.  But  as  he  was  carried 
down  below  deck  to  die,  he  covered  them  and  his  face 
with  a  handkerchief  lest  his  men  should  see  that  he  was 
dying  and  be  discouraged.  Before  he  died  he  knew  that  the 
victory  had  been  won.  Almost  his  last  words  were,  '  Thank 
God  I  have  done  my  duty,'  and  then  he  asked  his  friend 
Captain  Hardy  to  kiss  him. 

We  may  still  see  Nelson's  ship,  the  Victory,  at  anchor 
outside  Portsmouth  harbour.  Very  quaint  it  seems  to  us 
to-day,  when  we  compare  our  own  ironclad  men-of-war  with 
this  battleship  of  a  hundred  years  ago. 

In  spite  of  Trafalgar  Napoleon  seemed  all-powerful,  for 
after  Ulm  he  won  a  very  brilliant  victory  at  Austerlitz,  and 
once  more  Austria  and  Russia  made  peace  with  him.  At 
the  beginning  of  the  French  revolutionary  wars,  the  leaders 
of  the  Revolution  had  tried  to  set  up  republics  all  around 
France,  but  now  Napoleon  did  away  with  the  republics  and 
turned  them  into  kingdoms,  as  he  had  really  made  France 
again. 

But  they  were  not  to  be  independent  kingdoms.  Most 
of  them  were  ruled  by  Napoleon's  brothers,  or  his  generals, 
and  all  of  course  had  to  do  exactly  what  the  Emperor 
told  them.  All  Napoleon  really  cared  for  now  was  victory 
and  power.  He  drove  the  King  and  Queen  from  Naples 
and  put  his  brother  Joseph  there  as  '  King  of  the  Two 
Sicilies.'  Holland,  or  the  Batavian  Republic,  now  became  a 
kingdom  again  under  his  brother  Louis. 

The  Electorate  of  Hanover,  which  belonged  to  the 
English  King,  was  taken,  and  for  a  time  given  to  Prussia, 
but  later,  with  some  other  states  joined  to  it,  became  the 
kingdom  of  Westphalia,  and  over  this  another  brother, 
Jerome  Bonaparte,  reigned  as  king.  Napoleon  had  himself 
crowned  King  of  North  Italy.  The  smaller  German  states 
he  joined  together  under  his  protection,  and  called  them 
the  '  Confederation  of  the  Rhine.' 

As  though  to  make  all  these  changes  in  Europe  the  more 


480  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

remarkable  still,  the  Emperor  of  Austria  gave  up  his  title 
of  Holy  Roman  Emperor,  which  had  been  so  carefully 
treasured  and  handed  down  through  the  Middle  Ages,  and 
called  himself  for  the  future  the  hereditary  Emperor  of 
Austria.  Napoleon  would  dearly  have  loved  the  title  of 
Roman  Emperor  for  himself.  All  this  Russia  and  Austria 
had  to  agree  to,  when  the  coalition  broke  up  in  1806.  Soon 
after  this  William  Pitt  died.  Charles  James  Fox,  one  of 
the  greatest  statesmen  of  the  day,  who  had  at  first  been 
enthusiastic  about  the  French  Revolution  because  of  its  cry 
for  *  freedom,'  now  tried  to  make  peace  with  Napoleon  too, 
but  failed. 

Now  at  last  the  King  of  Prussia,  Frederick  William  iii., 
declared  war  too  against  Napoleon,  but  his  army  was  com- 
pletely defeated  at  the  battle  of  Jena,  and  Napoleon  marched 
to  Berlin,  the  Prussian  capital.  Then  Russia  joined  the 
army  of  Prussia,  but  both  were  defeated,  and  Napoleon  and 
Alexander  of  Russia  met  and  made  the  Peace  of  Tilsit. 
They  met  in  a  raft  on  the  middle  of  the  river  at  Tilsit. 
Napoleon  cleverly  did  all  he  could  to  make  the  young  Tsar 
admire  him.  When  he  had  done  this,  he  flattered  him  by 
suggesting  that  they  two  should  divide  Europe  and  Asia 
between  them. 

Napoleon's  idea  was  that  he  himself  should  be  Emperor 
of  the  West,  by  which  he  meant  all  Europe  except  Russia 
and  Sweden,  while  Alexander  should  be  Emperor  of  the 
East,  and  be  allowed  to  win  power  over  Sweden  and 
Turkey.  The  idea  pleased  Alexander  very  much.  For  five 
years  Napoleon  and  Alexander  were  friends.  Napoleon's 
first  idea  after  the  Peace  of  Tilsit  was  to  try  once  more  to 
ruin  England.  He  forbade  every  country  in  Europe  to  trade 
with  Britain.  As  every  country  in  Europe  depended  very 
much  on  the  things  brought  to  them  in  English  ships,  this 
would  have  been  very  difficult.  The  countries  of  Europe 
still  bought  things  brought  in  English  ships,  and  had  to 
pay  more  for  them  because  of  the  extra  difficulties.     Even 


THE  STORY  OF  NAPOLEON  481 

Napoleon  had  to  buy  cloth  for   his  soldiers'    clothes   from 
England. 

The  two  most  faithful  friends  which  England  had  were 
Sweden  and  the  little  kingdom  of  Portugal.  Alexander  of 
Russia  was  left  to  deal  with  Sweden.  Alexander  attacked 
Sweden,  whose  brave  king,  Gustavus  iv.,  was  made  to  abdicate 
because  he  would  not  give  up  his  friendship  with  England. 
His  uncle  was  made  King  of  Sweden,  but  had  to  agree  that 
one  of  Napoleon's  generals  should  be  king  after  him.  He  had 
to  give  up  Finland  too,  which  was  now  taken  by  Russia. 
While  Napoleon  made  up  his  mind  to  punish  Portugal,  he 
thought  it  would  be  easy  enough.  He  made  up  his  mind 
to  send  a  French  army  into  Spain,  and  he  asked  the  chief 
officer  of  the  Spanish  king  to  join  a  Spanish  army  with  it. 
These  two  armies  poured  into  Portugal,  and  the  royal  family 
and  all  the  greatest  men  of  Portugal  took  refuge  in  the  fleet. 
Some  English  ships  came  to  protect  them,  and  they  sailed  off 
to  Brazil. 

Meanwhile  there  was  much  quarrelling  between  the  king, 
Charles  iv.  of  Spain,  who  was  almost  an  imbecile,  and 
his  son  Ferdinand,  who  was  not  much  better.  Napoleon 
asked  them  both  to  meet  him  at  Bayonne,  and  there  he 
threatened  Ferdinand,  who  called  himself  already  King  of 
Spain,  because  his  father  had  abdicated,  that  if  he  also  did 
not  give  up  his  claim  to  the  throne  in  a  few  hours,  he  should 
be  treated  as  a  rebel. 

So  Ferdinand  gave  up  his  rights  to  his  father  again,  but 
Charles  iv.  had  already  sold  his  kingdom  to  Napoleon  for 
a  palace  in  France  and  a  pension.  Then  Napoleon  offered 
the  crown  of  Spain  to  Louis  his  brother,  remarking  that 
the  climate  of  Holland  did  not  suit  him.  But  Louis 
refused,  and  it  was  then  given  to  Joseph  Bonaparte,  who 
gave  up  his  kingdom  of  the  Two  Sicilies  to  one  of 
Napoleon's  generals. 


2  H 


482  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

Spain's  Struggle  with  Napoleon 

But  while  Napoleon  had  been  busy  making  all  these 
arrangements  he  had  forgotten  all  about  the  Spanish  people. 
It  was  a  dreadful  mistake.  They  were  very  angry  indeed 
when  they  heard  that  their  country  was  being  bought  and  sold 
in  this  way.  National  feeling  in  Spain  rose  against  Napoleon. 
The  people  were  determined  to  fight  this  conqueror  and  tyrant. 
Every  peasant  took  up  arms,  and  though  the  armies  of  Spain 
were  made  up  of  men  who  had  not  fought  before,  they  soon 
showed  themselves  able  to  fight  the  French  armies  on  equal 
terms.  The  siege  of  Saragossa,  the  capital  of  Aragon,  is 
among  the  famous  sieges  of  history. 

There  were  only  a  few  hundred  Spanish  soldiers  to  hold 
its  low  brick  wall  against  a  large  French  army,  but  women 
and  children  and  monks  and  nuns,  as  well  as  the  ordinary 
men  of  the  city,  did  their  part  to  help.  The  children  carried 
the  cartridges  which  the  nuns  made.  When  the  hospital 
where  the  wounded  soldiers  lay  was  set  on  fire,  the  women 
carried  the  men  from  their  beds  through  the  flames.  At 
another  place  an  army  of  18,000  French  had  to  surrender 
their  arms  to  an  army  of  young  Spanish  soldiers  quite  new 
to  war.  The  tale  of  these  things  spread  through  Europe. 
The  English  sent  armies  too  to  help  the  Spaniards,  and  so 
beffan  the  '  Peninsular  War.' 

In  this  war  there  fought  on  the  English  side  Sir  Arthur 
Wellesley,  who  afterwards  became  famous  as  the  Duke  of 
Wellington.  He  had  already  won  great  victories  for  England 
over  the  natives  in  India,  who  had  risen  against  the  English 
when  Napoleon  had  sent  them  word  that  he  was  coming 
to  help  them  to  'drive  the  English  out  of  India.'  Wellesley 
landed  in  Portugal  in  August  1808,  and  drove  the  French 
armies  right  out  of  that  country.  This  was  a  great  gain, 
for  now  England  had  a  country  from  which  she  could  attack 
Napoleon  overland. 

Sir  Arthur  Wellesley  was  called  back  to  England,  but 


THE  STORY  OF  NAPOLEON  483 

Sir  John  Moore,  in  the  same  winter,  prevented  Napoleon, 
who  had  now  come  unexpectedly,  from  conquering  the 
South.  Sir  John  Moore  had  to  lead  his  men  over  the 
ridges  of  the  hills  of  Galicia  to  Corunna,  where  he  expected 
English  ships  to  take  his  worn-out  soldiers  back  to  England. 
It  was  one  of  the  greatest  retreats  of  history.  The  hills 
were  covered  with  snow.  Every  now  and  then  the  English 
had  to  turn  and  fight  the  foremost  of  those  following  them. 
Napoleon  did  not  follow  long,  for  he  had  to  go  back  to 
Germany,  but  one  of  his  generals  took  his  place.  At  last, 
when  they  reached  the  coast,  the  English  army  turned  and 
fought  one  more  great  battle.  They  won,  but  the  noble  Sir 
John  Moore  was  killed.  Every  child  knows  the  poem  which 
tells  about  his  burial. 

Then  Sir  Arthur  Wellesley  came  back  to  Spain.  For 
five  years  he  fought  against  the  French  generals  there. 
The  Spanish  armies  were  not  much  use  to  him,  but  the 
ordinary  peasants  and  working  people  helped  him  very 
much.  He  had  to  fight  the  great  battles  himself,  but 
wherever  a  few  French  soldiers  were  met  by  peasants 
they  were  attacked  and  killed,  for  the  Spaniards  were  now 
full  of  hate  for  the  French,  who  had  tried  to  buy  and  sell 
their  nation. 

During  five  years  Napoleon  had  to  leave  250,000  soldiers 
to  fight  in  Spain,  while  he  himself  was  fighting  in  other 
places.  He  always  thought  that  his  officers  there  were 
fighting  badly.  It  was  a  long  time  before  he  understood 
what  a  great  soldier  Wellesley  was,  though  at  last  he  said,  so 
the  story  tells  us,  *  This  Wellesley  seems  to  be  a  man 
indeed.'  He  did  not  then  know  that  this  same  Wellesley,  as 
Duke  of  Wellington,  was  to  overthrow  his  power  at  last. 

The  example  of  Spain  filled  the  peoples  of  Europe  with 
enthusiasm.  Up  to  now  there  had  not  been  any  real  national 
feeling  in  any  country  of  Europe  except  England.  In  the 
east  of  Europe,  as  we  have  seen,  districts  were  bought  and 
sold  and  handed  about  from  one  country  to  another.     But 


484  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

now  things  were  different.  The  peoples  in  Europe  began  to 
hate  Napoleon  just  as  the  people  of  Spain  did.  The  French 
Revolution  itself,  though  it  now  seemed  a  failure,  had  spread 
new  ideas  of  freedom  among  the  peoples  of  Europe. 

Napoleon  himself,  though  he  would  have  no  government 
by  the  people,  which  was  what  the  leaders  of  the  Revolu- 
tion had  wanted,  made  many  reforms  in  the  countries  he 
conquered.  Better  laws  and  justice  were  given.  In  France 
much  better  schools  were  set  up,  and  Napoleon  tried  to  have 
even  the  poor  boys  in  the  countries  he  conquered  educated, 
though  he  thought  that  education  did  not  matter  at  all  for 
girls.  They  were  best  at  home  with  their  mothers,  he  thought. 
He  was  very  old-fashioned  indeed  on  this  subject.  But  per- 
haps the  greatest  reform  of  all  was  the  setting  free  of  many 
serfs  in  the  east  of  Europe.  With  this  freedom  the  peasants 
began  to  feel  a  hope  and  pride  in  the  countries  to  which  they 
belonged. 

The  defeat  of  the  Prussians  at  Jena  made  that  people  very 
angry,  and  a  great  Prussian  statesman  named  Stein  now  arose 
and  made  many  reforms  in  Prussia.  The  serfs  were  free  and 
every  young  man  was  trained  in  the  army.  Many  of  these 
things  were  what  Napoleon  himself  had  advised  in  other 
countries,  but  when  he  found  people  doing  these  things  for 
themselves  he  was  afraid,  for  he  knew  that  the  love  of  freedom 
would  grow  and  that  the  nations  would  rise  against  him.  So 
he  made  the  King  of  Prussia  send  Stein  away. 

But  he  could  not  destroy  the  work  he  had  begun.  A  new 
love  of  freedom  spread  through  all  Germany,  a  sort  of  excite- 
ment like  that  which  had  moved  the  men  of  the  Renaissance. 
New  German  poets  like  the  great  Goethe  began  to  write,  and 
the  young  men  of  Germany  joined  themselves  in  secret  clubs 
and  societies,  determined  to  drive  the  hated  foreigners  out 
of  their  land.  The  little  district  of  Tyrol  had  belonged  to 
Austria  for  four  hundred  years,  but  now  it  had  been  given  to 
the  King  of  Bavaria.     It  rose  in  revolt. 

Tyrol  is  a  country  of  mountains  where  simple  peasants 


THE  STORY  OF  NAPOLEON  485 

lived,  but  it  was  the  peasants  who  were  now  showing  them- 
selves so  brave  everywhere.  They  were  led  by  Andrew 
Hofer,  a  village  innkeeper,  a  tall  man,  strong  as  a  giant.  The 
peasants  rose  under  him  and  won  their  country  back  for  a  time, 
but  they  were  defeated  later,  and  Hofer  was  shot. 

Meanwhile  Napoleon  had  defeated  the  Austrians  once 
more  at  the  battle  of  Wagram.  The  Emperor  of  Austria 
was  forced  to  make  peace,  and  he  was  forced  too  to  allow  an 
Austrian  princess,  the  Archduchess  Marie  Louise,  to  marry 
Napoleon.  The  Empress  Josephine  had  not  had  any  children 
since  her  marriage  with  Napoleon,  and  he  longed  above  all 
things  to  have  a  son  to  hold  his  empire  after  him.  So  now 
he  divorced  Josephine  in  spite  of  her  begging  him  not  to  do 
so.  She  lived  quietly  by  herself  after  this,  and  the  Emperor 
sometimes  visited  her.  He  was  full  of  joy  when  Marie 
Louise  had  a  son,  who  is  generally  called  the  young 
Napoleon.  He  did  not  know  that,  while  his  son  was  still  a 
little  child,  he  would  lose  the  empire  he  had  meant  to  hand 
on  to  him. 

The  Fall  of  Napoleon 

Napoleon  seemed  now  more  powerful  than  ever.  The 
English  armies  which  were  sent  to  help  in  Europe  were  not 
sent  to  the  right  places,  for  the  second  Lord  Chatham,  the 
son  of  the  elder  Pitt  and  brother  of  the  younger,  was  not  a 
clever  man,  and  it  was  he  who  had  the  arrangement  of  the 
war.  But  now,  at  last,  the  friendship  between  Alexander  of 
Russia  and  Napoleon  came  to  an  end.  Alexander  would 
not  help  Napoleon  to  try  to  ruin  the  English  trade,  and  so 
Napoleon  made  up  his  mind  to  attack  Russia  itself. 

He  led  what  he  called  his  Grand  Army  of  half  a  million 
of  his  best  soldiers  trained  now  in  many  years  of  war.  Half 
of  these  were  PVench,  the  rest  soldiers  from  the  countries  he 
had  conquered.  When  he  reached  Dresden  with  his  army, 
Marie  Louise  and  the  little  King  of  Rome,  as  the  baby  was 
called,  were  with  him.     The  Emperor  of  Austria,  the  King 


486  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

of  Prussia,  and  other  kings  were  present  to  do  him  honour. 
It  was  for  the  last  time. 

And  now  Napoleon  led  his  great  army  into  Russia.  He 
was  sure  of  victory,  but  he  did  not  know  Russia.  On  he 
marched  across  the  vast  country,  but  the  heat  was  terrible, 
for  in  Russia  the  summers  are  very  hot  and  the  winters 
terribly  cold.  Many  horses  died  and  many  soldiers  deserted, 
and  the  Russian  generals  instead  of  fighting  led  Napoleon 
on  across  the  vast  country.  Winter  was  coming  on,  and 
Napoleon  thought  of  staying  where  he  was  till  the  spring. 
But  he  was  impatient.  He  must  conquer  Russia  and  take 
Moscow  at  once,  and  so  he  pushed  on. 

One  battle  there  was  in  which  he  conquered  the  Russians, 
but  lost  thirty  thousand  men  himself.  A  week  later  the 
Grand  Army,  or  what  was  left  of  it,  reached  Moscow. 
Food  had  run  short,  but  now  all  hoped  to  get  as  much  as 
they  wanted.  Napoleon  expected  that  the  Tsar  would  come 
to  meet  him,  and  surrender  himself  and  the  keys  of  the 
capital.  But  what  was  his  surprise  when  he  reached  the  city 
to  find  the  streets  empty.  There  were  no  people,  and  worse 
still,  there  was  no  food.  Indeed  the  city  was  breaking  into 
flames,  for  the  Russians  had  preferred  to  burn  their  town 
rather  than  give  it  up  to  Napoleon. 

And  now  there  was  nothing  to  do  but  turn  back  and 
march  across  that  dreary  land  through  the  terrible  frost  and 
snow,  west  again.  A  Russian  army  blocked  the  way,  and 
in  another  battle  thousands  more  men  were  lost.  There 
was  nothing  to  eat  but  horse-flesh,  and  the  soldiers'  clothes 
froze  on  them.  Napoleon,  in  the  grey  overcoat  which  he 
always  wore,  was  pale  and  haggard  with  anxiety.  All  the 
way  the  Russians  attacked  the  outer  parts  of  the  army  with- 
out giving  battle.  At  the  river  Beresina  the  bridge  had  been 
cut  down,  and  the  Russians  were  waiting  at  the  other  side. 
The  French  built  a  bridge  and  struggled  across  the  icy  water, 
but  the  Russians  attacked  them,  and  thousands  were  driven 
back  into  the  river  and  drowned. 


THE  STORY  OF  NAPOLEON  487 

Napoleon  never  showed  any  sign  of  weakness,  but  led  the 
remnant  of  his  army  on  until,  at  the  town  of  Vilna,  he  heard 
bad  news,  and  at  last  left  his  army  and  pushed  on  as  fast  as 
he  could  to  Paris.  After  this  the  army  fell  into  disorder, 
and  only  a  few  thousands  of  the  half  million  men,  whom 
Napoleon  had  led  so  proudly  into  Russia,  crossed  the  river 
Niemen  and  left  it  again.  At  Paris  Napoleon  said  that 
things  had  gone  well,  but  that  the  cold  of  the  winter  had 
caused  losses  in  the  army.     But  he  could  not  deceive  Europe. 

The  Prussian  people  now  rose  and  forced  the  government 
to  declare  war  once  more  on  Napoleon.  Russia  joined  them, 
and  then  Austria.  The  armies  against  Napoleon  were  more 
dangerous  than  ever  before,  but  he  did  not  give  up  hope. 
He  was  still  able  to  get  together  an  enormous  army,  and  he 
won  one  more  victory  at  Dresden,  but  at  the  great  '  Battle  of 
the  Nations  '  at  Leipzig  he  was  defeated  and  driven  across  the 
Rhine. 

Even  now  the  countries  of  Europe  would  have  been  glad 
to  leave  him  France  for  himself,  but  he  would  not  agree,  and 
so  the  armies  followed  him  into  France.  Even  now  he  won 
brilliant  victories,  but  he  could  no  longer  keep  his  enemies 
divided,  and  fight  them  one  by  one,  as  he  had  so  often  and  so 
cleverly  done  before.  His  generals  told  him  it  was  madness 
to  resist,  and  at  last  the  great  Emperor,  who  had  defied 
Europe  so  long,  had  to  confess  that  he  was  beaten. 

At  first  he  offered  to  abdicate  in  favour  of  his  son,  but 
none  would  agree  to  this.  He  had  to  abdicate  altogether. 
But  even  now  the  people  of  Europe  hardly  dared  to  suggest 
that  he  should  become  as  other  men.  He  was  still  to  be 
called  'Emperor,'  but  he  was  to  be  kept  quite  safe  on  the 
little  island  of  Elba,  which  was  to  be  the  only  land  left  to 
him.  There  Napoleon  went,  and  the  brother  of  Louis  xvi. 
came  to  be  King  of  France,  and  was  called  Louis  xviii. 

A  congress  of  representatives  of  the  five  great  countries  of 
Europe,  Russia,  Prussia,  Austria,  France,  and  Great  Britain, 
met  at  Vienna.     There  were  many  things  to  settle  after  the 


488  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

terrible  confusion  of  the  last  twenty-five  years,  and  the  repre- 
sentatives soon  began  to  quarrel.  Meanwhile  Napoleon  was 
lonely  in  Elba,  alone  with  thoughts,  which  drove  him  nearly 
mad,  of  all  he  had  lost  and  all  he  had  nearly  won.  Marie 
Louise  had  gone  home  to  Austria  and  taken  her  baby  with  her. 
She  had  refused  to  follow  her  husband  to  the  lonely  island  of 
Elba.  Napoleon  had  joked  as  he  looked  down  one  day  from 
the  top  of  the  highest  hill  in  Elba,  saying  with  a  smile,  *  It 
must  be  confessed  that  my  island  is  very  small.' 

But  at  last  he  could  bear  it  no  longer.  He  made  up  his 
mind  to  have  one  last  try  for  power.  He  had  heard  that  the 
new  King  of  France,  Louis  xviii.,  was  not  a  man  whom  the 
French  would  love  or  admire.  He  knew,  too,  that  his  own 
soldiers  had  loved  him,  and  remembered  how  the  men  of  his 
Imperial  Guard  had  wept  when  he  bade  them  good-bye.  He 
would  go  to  France  and  try  to  win  it  back  again. 

Soon  news  came  to  Vienna  that  Napoleon  had  landed  in 
France  and  was  marching  to  Paris,  and  that  the  French 
soldiers  were  trooping  to  his  standard,  and  Louis  xviii.  had 
fled.  The  Congress  broke  up.  Nothing  could  be  done  until 
he  was  conquered  again.  Wellington,  who  had  driven  the 
French  right  out  of  Spain  in  1813,  was  the  man  to  save 
Europe.  For  a  hundred  days  Napoleon  ruled  at  Paris,  getting 
together  once  more  an  enormous  army,  while  Prussia  and 
England  and  Austria  and  Russia  did  the  same. 

But  Napoleon  was  the  quickest,  and  he  made  up  his 
mind  to  attack  the  Prussians  under  their  general,  Bliicher,  in 
Belgium,  then  the  English  under  Wellington,  before  the  two 
armies  could  join  together,  and  before  the  Russians  and 
Austrians,  who  were  marching  across  Europe,  should  come 
up  to  them.  He  attacked  the  Prussians  at  Ligny  and  de- 
feated them.  Bliicher  then  drew  his  army  back  towards 
Wavre,  but  Napoleon  thought  he  had  gone  to  Namur. 
Napoleon  sent  some  regiments  towards  Namur  to  prevent 
Bliicher  joining  the  English.  He  then  turned  to  attack 
Wellington  at  a  place  called  Quatre  Bras,  or  the  Four  Roads. 


THE  STORY  OF  NAPOLEON 


489 


Wellington  had  already  fought  with  one  of  Napoleon's 
officers,  but  neither  side  won,  and  now  Wellington  drew  off 
towards  Waterloo,  a  plain  near  Brussels.  Here  Napoleon 
followed  and  attacked,  and  on  the  18th  of  June  the  great 
battle  of  Waterloo  was  fought.  It  was  the  first  time  that 
Napoleon  and  Wellington  had  met  to  fight  each  other. 

The  English  army  was  posted 
on  a  ridge  of  hills.  On  the  road 
below  he  left  men  to  guard  the 
farmhouse  of  La  Haye  Sainte, 
and  still  further  to  the  right  more 
men  to  guard  the  farm  and  castle 
of  Hougoumont.  The  French 
were  drawn  up  on  a  ridge  at  the 
other  side  of  the  valley.  Both 
generals  were  sure  of  victory. 

At  half  -  past  eleven  in 
the  morning  the  battle  began. 
Napoleon's  plan  of  battle  was  to 
stagger  the  enemy's  front  with 
artillery,  and  then,  before  they 
had  recovered,  to  send  in  bodies 
of  cavalry  to  break  them  up  or 
ride  them  down.  But  he  could 
hardly  do  this  with  the  two  farms 

in  the  way.  The  French,  therefore,  made  many  determined 
attacks  on  La  Haye  Sainte  and  Hougoumont,  but  could  not 
take  them.  It  was  a  tremendous  struggle,  and  very  equal, 
but  at  half-past  four  in  the  afternoon  Bllicher  with  his 
Prussians,  tired  after  a  long  march  but  fresh  enough  to  fight, 
came  up  and  attacked  the  right  of  the  French  army.  Soon 
after  Wellington  cried,  '  Up,  guards,  and  at  them  ! '  and  the 
fifteen  hundred  English  guards  whom  he  had  kept  in  reserve 
till  then  dashed  on  to  the  French  ranks.  The  line  broke, 
and  the  French  turned  and  fled. 

Only  the  Imperial  Guards  stood  close  round  the  Emperor. 


THE    DUKE    OF    WELLINGTON 


490  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

The  British  begged  them  to  surrender,  for  they  hated  to 
cut  down  such  brave  men.  '  The  Guard  dies  but  does  not 
surrender,'  was  the  answer.  At  last  Napoleon  rode  sadly 
from  the  field.  He  had  lost  everything.  True,  twenty-five 
thousand  English  and  Prussians  lay  dead  on  the  field,  and 
Wellington  wept  as  the  list  was  read  to  him. 

But  it  was  the  end  of  the  great  struggle,  and  Napoleon 
knew  it.  He  tried  to  get  away  in  a  ship  to  America,  but  the 
shores  of  France  were  too  closely  watched.  At  last  he  gave 
himself  up  to  the  English  officers  on  the  battleship  the 
Bellerophon,  which  sailed  to  Plymouth.  Meanwhile  it  had 
been  decided  that  he  should  be  sent  to  the  island  of  St. 
Helena,  half-way  between  the  coasts  of  Africa  and  South 
America.  There  he  would  be  safe.  He  lived  there  for  six 
years,  with  sentinels  posted  round  his  house,  and  an  English 
officer  visiting  him  every  day  to  make  sure  that  he  was  still 
there.  English  battleships  lay  at  anchor  round  the  island 
to  make  doubly  sure. 

For  the  most  part  he  was  calm,  and  spent  much  of  his 
time  writing  down  his  '  memoirs,'  the  story  of  his  life,  as  it 
seemed  to  him.  There  is  much  that  is  true  and  much  that  is 
false  in  his  story.  Near  him  were  always  the  portraits  of 
Josephine,  who  died  soon  after  Waterloo,  and  Marie  Louise 
and  his  son,  the  young  Napoleon,  who  was  never  to  be  emperor 
after  all.  Napoleon  was  buried  at  St.  Helena,  but  years 
afterwards  the  French  people,  remembering  his  greatness,  for 
he  was,  after  all,  one  of  the  greatest  men  who  have  ever  lived, 
had  his  body  carried  to  Paris  and  buried  there  in  a  gorgeous 
tomb,  with  a  circle  of  great  marble  figures  looking  down  on 
the  spot  where  the  body  of  the  Emperor  lies. 


CHAPTER  XLV 

THE  REMAKING  OF  EUROPE 

The  Congress  at  Vienna  had  now  to  begin  again  the  work  of 
putting  order  into  the  Europe  with  which  Napoleon  had  been 
playing  chess  for  so  many  years.  France  was  reduced  to  the 
size  it  had  been  in  1789,  before  the  revolutionary  wars  began. 
Many  of  the  provinces  she  had  conquered  on  the  Rhine  were 
more  French  than  German,  but  most  of  the  German  states 
were  formed  into  a  loose  '  Confederation,'  and  these  were 
included  in  it.  The  part  of  Poland  which  had  been  taken 
from  Prussia  was  given  to  Alexander  of  Russia.  Holland 
and  Belgium  were  joined  together  as  one  kingdom,  and 
given  to  the  royal  House  of  Orange,  the  former  rulers  of 
Holland. 

Holland  and  Belgium  were  two  quite  different  nations 
in  race  and  in  religion,  but  no  notice  was  taken  of  nation- 
ality, although  it  was  really  the  spirit  of  nationalism  which 
had  overthrown  Napoleon  at  last.  The  north  of  Italy  was 
given  back  to  Austria,  and  Savoy  to  the  King  of  Sardinia. 
The  King  and  Queen  of  Naples  went  back  to  their  kingdom. 
Spain  had  already  been  given  back  to  Ferdinand  vii. 

The  great  kings  of  Europe  looked  on  the  French  Revolu- 
tion as  a  thing  which  was  over.  It  was  to  them  a  kind  of 
bad  dream.  Some  of  its  ideas  had  already  become  part  of  the 
laws  of  the  countries,  but  the  '  Holy  Alliance,'  in  which  the 
Emperor  of  Austria,  the  Tsar  of  Russia,  and  the  King  of 
Prussia  joined,  made  it  quite  clear  that  they  believed  in 
absolute  government.  They  would  try  to  do  good  things  for 
the  people,  but  the  people  must  not  do  anything  for  them- 
selves. 

491 


492  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

So  the  nineteenth  century  began,  but  the  ideas  of  the 
French  Revolution  were  not  dead,  and  all  the  nations  have 
been  slowly  winning  the  liberty  and  equality  which  the 
Revolution  had  tried  to  teach.  Louis  xviii.  was  restored  to 
the  throne  of  France  once  more,  but  it  was  understood  that 
he  was  to  give  the  nation  a  '  constitution. '  France  was  to 
have  a  parliament  of  two  houses  like  England. 

Louis  XVIII.  was  a  sensible  and  rather  clever  man.  He 
had  spent  his  days  in  exile  since  the  Revolution  in  Russia, 
until  he  was  drif^en  away  twice  by  the  changing  plans  of 
both  tsars,  and  afterwards  in  England.  He  was  prepared 
to  be  very  tolerant  and  moderate,  but  the  lower  house  of 
his  first  parliament  was  very  violent.  The  elections  had 
been  made  while  emigres  were  pouring  back  to  France, 
and  many  of  the  people,  especially  in  the  south,  were  full 
of  relief  that  the  old  ways,  as  they  thought,  had  come  back. 
Many  of  the  people  who  were  known  to  have  been  in 
favour  of  the  Revolution  were  massacred  by  the  peasants, 
who  were  full  of  revenge  for  all  they  and  their  Church  had 
suffered.  These  massacres  were  afterwards  spoken  of  as  the 
*  White  Terror.'  The  lower  house  insisted  on  the  trial  of 
some  of  Napoleon's  greatest  friends,  and  the  brave  Marshal 
Ney  was  tried  and  shot.  Many  others  were  driven  from  the 
country.  But  at  last  Louis  dissolved  this  parliament,  and 
the  next  was  much  more  moderate. 

The  other  countries  of  Europe  had  left  a  large  army  in 
France,  and  France  had  to  pay  a  great  sum  of  money  to  help 
to  make  up  to  these  countries  for  the  expenses  of  the  wars 
against  Napoleon.  But  now  the  army  was  withdrawn,  and 
things  were  quiet  in  France  for  some  years.  Perhaps  the 
thing  which  the  French  people  felt  most  in  the  conditions  of 
peace  of  1815,  was  that  most  of  the  beautiful  works  of  art 
which  Napoleon  had  stolen  from  all  over  Europe  and  brought 
to  Paris  had  to  be  sent  back. 

Louis  XVIII.  reigned  in  France  until  he  died  in  1824, 
and    his   brother   became   king  and   was   called   Charles   x. 


THE  REMAKING  OF  EUROPE  493 

Charles  x.  was  not  such  a  wise  man  as  Louis  xviii.  He 
was  not  content  to  rule  as  a  constitutional  king.  *  I  would 
rather  hew  wood,'  he  said,  '  than  be  a  king  like  the  king  of 
England.'  It  was  under  Charles  that  France  won  Algiers 
in  the  North  of  Africa,  the  most  prosperous  of  the  French 
possessions  to-day,  but  nothing  could  make  Charles  popular. 
He  stopped  the  freedom  of  the  Press,  and  Paris  rose  in 
revolt.  Once  more  the  '  tricolour,'  the  flag  of  the  Revolu- 
tion, was  seen  in  the  streets. 

The  soldiers  and  the  citizens  fought,  but  the  soldiers  had 
never  really  had  much  enthusiasm  for  fighting  against  the 
tricolour.  The  citizens  won,  for  many  of  the  soldiers  went 
over  to  them.  The  palace  of  the  Tuileries  was  again 
attacked,  but  the  king  was  not  there.  When  he  sent  word 
that  he  was  ready  to  grant  freedom  to  the  Press  again  he 
was  told  that  it  was  too  late.  He  fled  to  England,  where 
William  iv.  was  now  king. 

Many  of  the  Parisians  had  hoped  for  a  republic  once  more, 
but  this  was  not  yet  to  be,  and  the  French  Crown  was 
offered  to  the  duke  of  Orleans,  a  member  of  the  royal  family, 
who  had  fought  as  a  young  man  when  the  armies  of  the 
Revolution  were  attacked  by  the  invaders  at  Valmy.  But 
Louis  Philippe,  though  he  reigned  until  1848,  never  really 
suited  the  French.  They  wanted  more  reforms  than  he 
could  grant.  Once  more  in  1848  an  attack  was  made  on  the 
palace  of  the  Tuileries,  and  Louis  Philippe  had  to  abdicate 
in  his  turn.  He  was  seventy -five  when  he  fled  away  with  his 
queen  into  exile. 

France  now  became  a  republic  again  with  Louis  Napoleon, 
the  nephew  of  the  Emperor  Napoleon,  as  its  president.  He 
was  the  son  of  Louis  Bonaparte,  the  former  king  of  Holland. 
Napoleon's  own  son,  the  '  king  of  Rome,'  had  died  at  the  age 
of  twenty.  He  had  always  been  a  delicate  boy,  and  he  died 
worn  out  with  longing  to  be  able  to  do  something  to  win 
his  father's  empire  back.  It  was  not  long  before  Prince 
Louis  Napoleon  was  able  to  have  himself  proclaimed  Emperor. 


494  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

He  was  called  Napoleon  iii.,  as  though  he  had  a  right  to 
succeed  to  the  son  of  Napoleon,  who  was  therefore  spoken 
of  as  Napoleon  ii.  So  France  was  ruled  by  an  emperor  once 
more,  though  not  for  long. 

Meanwhile,  changes  in  Europe  had  followed  both  the 
revolution  of  1830  and  this  of  1848.  Belgium  had  rebelled 
ao-ainst  being  joined  with  Holland,  and  had  become  a  separate 
kingdom  under  a  German  prince,  the  uncle  of  Princess 
Victoria,  who  became  Queen  of  England  in  1837.  Hanover 
could  not  be  held  by  women,  and  so  no  longer  belonged  to  the 
English  sovereign.  It  was  soon  joined  to  Prussia.  Poland, 
filled  with  the  spirit  of  nationality  and  wish  for  freedom,  rose 
against  Russia,  but  the  rebellion  was  put  down.  With  the 
death  of  Ferdinand  vii.  in  1833  Spain  also  got  a  constitution 
for  a  time. 

Before  this  the  nations  of  Europe  had  been  roused  to 
enthusiasm  by  the  struggle  of  the  Greek  people  for  inde- 
pendence against  the  Turks.  The  Sultan  at  Constantinople 
left  the  government  of  the  conquered  states  in  the  hands  of 
rulers  who  governed  them  very  much  as  they  liked.  These 
rulers,  who  were  of  course  Mohammedans,  were  often  very  cruel 
to  the  Christian  people  like  the  Greeks,  who  had  borne  their 
rule  for  centuries.  But  the  new  spirit  of  nationalism  was 
now  felt  by  the  Greeks,  and  they  rose  in  rebellion  against 
the  Turks.  Terrible  fighting  took  place,  for  the  Greeks 
were  as  cruel  as  the  Turks  once  they  had  risen,  just  as 
slaves  are  vicious  when  they  have  once  risen  against  their 
masters. 

At  first  the  countries  of  Europe  did  not  interfere,  although 
Russia,  and  England  especially,  were  in  favour  of  the  Greeks. 
But  volunteers  from  these  countries  went  to  help  the  Greeks. 
Among  them  was  the  poet  Lord  Byron,  who  was  full  of  the 
memories  of  the  great  days  of  Greece  and  enthusiasm  for  its 
writers.  The  modern  Greeks  could  hardly  be  looked  upon  as 
the  descendants  of  the  old  Greeks,  for  so  many  Romans  and 
other  peoples  had  since  mingled  with  the  people.    Still,  in  " 


THE  REMAKING  OF  EUROPE  495 

Greece  itself  there  was  a  new  enthusiasm  for  the  study  of  the 
old  Greek  literature  and  language. 

The  population  of  Greece  was  now  largely  made  up  of 
herdsmen  and  of  soldiers,  many  of  whom  were  brigands 
constantly  worrying  the  Turkish  rulers.  Lord  Byron  hoped 
that  the  glories  of  old  Greece  might  be  restored,  and  was 
full  of  this  dream  when  he  landed  in  Greece  to  help  them 
to  fight  in  1824.  He  went  to  Mesolonghi,  one  of  the 
strongest  places  on  the  west  coast  of  Greece,  but  he  caught 
fever  in  the  low  swampy  land  and  died. 

Still  he  had  given  the  Greeks  hope  and  courage. 
Mesolonghi  was  besieged  by  sea  and  land.  The  siege  lasted 
a  year,  and  then  all  the  food  and  powder  were  gone,  but 
the  Greeks  would  not  surrender.  They  preferred  to  die, 
and  when  they  could  hold  out  no  longer  men,  women,  and 
children  dashed  out  on  the  Turks,  and  died  fighting  outside 
the  town  they  had  defended  so  long.  At  last  England, 
France,  and  Russia  sent  help  to  the  Greeks,  and  a  great  battle 
was  fought  in  the  bay  of  Navarino.  The  Turks  were  defeated, 
but  there  were  some  years  of  fighting  yet.  England  did 
not  want  to  make  Turkey  too  weak,  because  this  would  make 
Russia  too  strong,  but  at  last  in  1833  it  was  arranged  that 
Greece  should  be  a  free  kingdom  under  Otto  of  Bavaria,  a 
prince  only  seventeen  years  old,  as  its  first  king.  This  new 
kingdom  was  to  have  a  constitution  too,  so  the  work  of  the 
French  Revolution  was  being  slowly  but  surely  done. 

Hungary,  the  beautiful  country  which  had  so  long  been 
under  the  rule  of  Austria,  though  it  belonged  to  quite  a 
different  race  from  the  people  of  that  country,  now  fought 
for  freedom  too.  For  many  years  the  Hungarians  had  chosen 
the  Emperor  to  rule  them,  but  now  it  had  become  a  matter 
of  course,  and  they  had  no  share  in  their  own  government 
and  there  was  no  freedom  of  the  Press. 

In  the  year  1837,  a  young  Hungarian,  Louis  Kossuth,  set 
up  a  newspaper,  in  which  the  new  ideas  of  liberty  found  a 
voice.     This  did  not  please  the  Austrian  government,  and 


496 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


Kossuth  was  put  in  prison  for  two  years.  At  last  he  was  set 
free,  and  started  his  newspaper  again.  The  people  looked  on 
him  as  a  leader.  When  the  revolution  of  1848  took  place  in 
France,  the  Hungarians  hoped  more  and  more  for  liberty,  and 
Louis  Kossuth  was  sent  with  some  other  chosen  men  to  ask 
for  reform  in  Hungary.  The  Emperor  promised,  for  he  was 
frightened  at  the  moment,  but  he  broke  his  promises,  and 

then  Hungary  rose  with  Louis 
Kossuth  as  its  leader  in  a  war 
against  Austria. 

The  peasants  flocked  armed 
with  knives  and  hatchets  to 
fight  for  their  country.  They 
defeated  the  Austrians  many 
times,  but  Austria  got  help 
from  Russia  and  thousands  of 
soldiers  marched  into  Hungary. 
The  Hungarians  had  to  give 
in.  Many  of  the  leaders  of  the 
rebellion  were  shot,  but  Louis 
Kossuth  escaped  from  the 
country.  The  United  States 
sent  a  ship  to  carry  him  over  to 
their  land,  but  afterwards  he 
went  to  live  in  Italy,  where  he  died  in  1894.  But  thirty 
years  before  this,  Hungary  had  won  her  freedom  after  all. 
Though  she  remains  under  the  Austrian  Emperor  her 
government  is  quite  independent  of  the  government  of 
Austria,  and  the  countries  ruled  over  by  the  Emperor  are  now 
called  together  Austria-Hungary. 

Soon  after  Napoleon  iii.  became  Emperor  of  France  the 
French  people  joined  the  English  in  a  war  with  Russia. 
Russia  had  w^on  Finland  and  so  become  the  chief  country  on 
the  shores  of  the  Baltic.  She  longed  to  capture  Constanti- 
nople and  launch  her  ships  on  the  Bosphorus.  Turkey  was 
in  a  very  weak  state.     The  Tsar  Nicholas  told  the  English 


,/^^. 


LOUIS    KOSSUTH,    THE    HUNGARIAN 
PATRIOT 


THE  REMAKING  OF  EUROPE  497 

that  Turkey  was  '  a  sick  man,  a  very  sick  man.'  He  felt 
that  it  would  be  easy  to  steal  all  he  wanted  from  the  '  sick 
man.'  He  was  willing  that  England  should  take  Egypt  and 
the  island  of  Crete,  and  would  have  liked  to  take  the  Turkish 
provinces  in  Europe  for  himself.  But  England  did  not  want 
Russia  to  become  too  strong,  and  refused.  One  reason  why 
England  did  not  care  for  the  Russians  to  grow  too  strong 
was  that  Russia  is  the  nearest  country  in  Europe  to  India, 
which  she  might  try  to  attack  through  the  passes  of  the 
Himalayas.  Russia  made  the  Turkish  treatment  of  the 
Christians  in  her  provinces  an  excuse  for  attacking  the 
Turkish  fleet  in  the  Black  Sea,  in  the  year  1854.  The 
Turkish  fleet  was  destroyed  and  four  thousand  Turks  killed. 
So  England  and  France  made  ready  to  attack  Russia  in  the 
peninsula  of  the  Crimea,  and  so  began  the  famous  Crimean 
War. 

The  English  commander  was  Lord  Raglan,  who  had  lost 
his  arm  at  Waterloo.  The  English  and  French  knew 
nothing  about  the  Crimea,  but  they  landed  in  September 
1854  at  a  place  near  the  mouth  of  the  river  Alma.  The 
Russians  were  drawn  up  on  a  ridge  of  hills  on  the  other  side 
of  the  river.  They  fired  on  the  English  and  French  all  the 
time  they  were  crossing  the  river,  but  they  went  bravely  on 
up  the  hill  and  broke  the  Russian  line  and  so  won  the  first 
battle  of  the  war.  Then  they  marched  on  to  Balaclava, 
where  again  they  defeated  the  Russians.  But  the  battle  of 
Balaclava  is  best  remembered  because  of  the  famous  charge 
of  the  Light  Brigade. 

Through  some  mistake  the  brigade,  a  company  of  cavalry, 
was  ordered  to  cross  a  mile  and  a  half  of  the  battlefield, 
where  it  would  be  fired  on  all  the  time,  and  charge  the 
Russian  guns.  It  was  a  terrible  order,  for  horse-soldiers 
cannot  attack  artillery  in  such  a  way,  but  though  they  knew 
it  was  a  mistake,  the  brigade  knew  too  that  a  soldier's 
first  duty  is  obedience.  They  made  the  charge  and  few 
came  back  to  tell  the  tale.     Everybody  knows  Tennyson's 

2  I 


498  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

poem  on  the  '  Charge  of  the  Light  Brigade.'  Their  courage 
will  never  be  forgotten.  The  French  general  looking  on  said, 
*  It  is  magnificent,  but  it  is  not  war.' 

As  winter  came  on  the  English  and  French  were  besieging 
Sebastopol.  The  cold  was  terrible,  and  the  soldiers  were 
short  of  clothes.  Some  ships  carrying  clothes  and  blankets 
were  wrecked  in  Balaclava  Bay,  and  the  things  were  all 
lost.  When  some  things  did  arrive  it  was  seen  that  terrible 
mistakes  had  been  made.  Once  a  great  case  of  boots  was 
unpacked.  They  were  all  for  the  right  foot !  The  men  fell 
ill  and  thousands  died. 


Florence  Nightingale 

It  was  now  that  Miss  Florence  Nightingale,  an  English 
lady,  took  nurses  out  to  care  for  the  sick  and  wounded  soldiers 
at  Scutari,  where  the  Turkish  barracks  had  been  made  into  a 
hospital.  But  at  last,  after  a  siege  of  three  hundred  and 
forty-nine  days,  Sebastopol  was  taken.  So  ended  the  Crimean 
War.  The  Black  Sea  was  opened  to  ships  of  all  countries,  and 
Russia  was  allowed  to  keep  only  six  warships  on  it. 

Ever  since  the  Crimean  War  the  Christian  nations  under 
the  Turks  in  Europe  have  been  longing  for  their  freedom. 
In  1877  Russia  joined  the  Christians  in  their  struggle,  and 
Roumania,  Servia,  and  Montenegro  won  their  independence. 
Other  provinces  were  put  under  the  protection  of  Austria  and 
afterwards  became  part  of  Austria-Hungary.  Bulgaria  got 
its  own  government,  but  had  to  pay  tribute.  It  is  now  quite 
free.  Even  to-day  the  people  of  Albania  and  the  districts  to 
the  north  of  Greece  are  struggling  for  their  freedom  from  the 
Turks.  They  are  being  helped  by  the  Servians  and  Bulgarians 
and  other  peoples  who  have  already  won  their  freedom. 
There  are  many  who  feel  that  things  will  not  be  right  until 
the  '  sick  man  of  Europe '  is  driven  out  of  Europe  altogether. 
The  Turks  are  a  brave  if  fierce  people,  but  Christian  peoples 
have  never  been  happy  under  their  rule. 


THE  REMAKING  OF  EUROPE 


499 


Immediately  after  the  Revolution  of  1848  in  France, 
which  once  more  filled  the  minds  of  men  all  over  Europe  with 
the  longing  for  freedom,  nearly  every  one  of  the  German 
states  demanded  a  '  constitution  '  from  their  princes.  There 
was  a  feeling,  too,  that  after  all  the  Germans  of  all  these  little 
states  belonged  to  one  race,  and  that  they  would  be  much 
stronger  if  they  could  join  together  and  become  one  nation. 
A  great  meeting  was  held  at 
Frankfort  to  discuss  this 
thing,  but  there  were  too 
many  quarrels. 

Some  people  wanted  to 
include  Austria.  Others  felt 
that  the  Austrians  were  not 
really  Germans,  and  wanted 
all  the  other  states  to  join 
with  Prussia  at  their  head. 
This  is  what  happened  after- 
wards, but  for  the  time  the 
idea  was  given  up.  But  as  the 
years  went  on  the  Germans 
were  more  and  more  inclined 
to  unite. 

The  King  of  Prussia, 
William  i.,  had  for  his  chief 
statesman  a  great  man  called 
Otto  von  Bismarck.  Bismarck 

was  one  of  the  greatest  statesmen  of  modern  times.  He  was 
stern  and  strong,  and  when  he  made  up  his  mind  to  do  a  thing 
he  did  it.  '  The  German  problem,'  he  said,  '  cannot  be  solved 
by  parliamentary  decrees,  but  by  blood  and  iron.'  He  knew 
that  before  Prussia  could  make  itself  the  head  of  a  new 
German  empire,  there  must  be  a  war  with  Austria.  In  1863 
Christian  ix.,  the  father  of  the  Princess  Alexandra,  who 
married  the  Prince  of  Wales,  afterwards  King  Edward  vii. 
of  England,  became  king  of  Denmark. 


QUEEN    VICTORIA 
(From  a  portrait  drawn  in  1857). 


500  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

For  many  years  the  little  states  of  Schleswig  and  Holstein, 
which  were  really  German,  had  belonged  to  Denmark,  but 
now  Prussia  and  Austria  fought  Denmark  for  them.  The 
Danes  fought  as  they  had  always  done,  splendidly,  but 
Denmark  is  too  small  a  country  to  fight  against  two  great 
powers,  and  in  the  end  they  had  to  give  up  Schleswig  and 
Holstein  to  the  enemy.  Then  Austria  and  Prussia  fought  for 
the  states  themselves  in  the  '  Seven  Weeks  War.'  The 
wonderful  army  which  Bismarck  had  made  for  Prussia  won 
the  victory,  and  Austria  gave  up  all  power  in  Germany. 

The  new  Prussian  province  of  Schleswig-Holstein  gave 
Germany  more  power  on  the  Baltic  coast.  Right  across 
the  province  there  is  now  a  canal  which  saves  the  German 
ships  from  sailing  round  the  stormy  coast  of  Denmark.  It 
is  in  the  harbour  of  Kiel  that  Germany  is  now  building  her 
*  Dreadnoughts,'  the  great  warships  which  many  Englishmen 
fear  are  being  prepared  to  attack  England's  supremacy  on 
the  seas. 

When  France  under  its  Emperor  Napoleon  iii.  saw  the 
growing  power  of  Germany,  it  grew  alarmed.  Bismarck  was 
glad  of  the  chance  of  war,  and  in  1870  a  war  between  France 
and  Prussia  broke  out.  The  French  people  were  still  full  of 
the  memory  of  Napoleon  and  the  great  victories  which  his 
armies  had  won.  They  did  not  realize  how  strong  the  army 
of  Prussia  had  grown  and  how  weak  their  own  now  was. 
They  went  into  the  war  with  a  light  heart.  The  German 
states  joined  readily  with  Prussia  and  sent  their  armies  to 
help  the  strong  Prussian  army  against  France.  In  all  the 
battles  which  the  Germans  won  the  conquering  army  was 
larger  than  the  French  army  it  defeated.  But  the  Germans 
were  really  better  prepared  for  war  in  every  way.  The  French 
won  the  first  battle,  in  which  the  young  Prince  Imperial,  the 
son  of  Napoleon  iii.,  fought  nobly,  but  it  was  their  only 
victory.  At  the  great  battle  of  Sedan  the  French  were 
surrounded,  and  though  they  fought  madly  the  better  trained 
soldiers  of  Prussia  conquered  them. 


THE  REMAKING  OF  EUROPE  501 

Napoleon  iii.  went  wherever  the  shots  were  thickest. 
He  was  hoping  to  be  killed,  but  at  last  he  made  up  his  mind 
to  surrender,  and  sent  the  message  to  old  King  William  :  '  Not 
having  been  able  to  die  in  the  midst  of  my  troops,  there  is 
nothing  left  for  me  but  to  give  up  my  sword  into  the  hands 
of  your  Majesty.'  An  emperor  who  could  not  win  battles 
would  never  be  tolerated  by  the  French.  This  Napoleon  in. 
knew,  and  he  left  France  for  ever  with  the  Empress  Eugenie. 
He  died  three  years  afterwards  in  England,  broken-hearted. 
The  Empress  Eugenie  lived  for  many  years  in  England,  loved 
and  admired  by  all  who  knew  her.  But  the  young  Prince 
Imperial  was  killed  in  the  Zulu  War,  fighting  nobly  for  the 
English  people  who  had  given  his  father  and  mother  a  home 
in  their  exile. 

But  though  the  Emperor  had  surrendered,  Paris  deter- 
mined to  resist.  For  four  months  the  siege  went  on.  The 
starving  Parisians  ate  horses  and  paid  large  sums  of  money 
for  dogs  and  cats  and  rats.  But  at  last  they  had  to  give  in, 
and  when  peace  was  made  they  had  to  give  up  Alsace  and 
Lorraine,  two  more  of  those  Rhine  provinces  which  were 
much  more  French  than  German.  The  French  have  never 
forgiven  the  Germans  for  their  defeat  in  the  Franco-Prussian 
War,  and  to  get  back  Alsace  and  Lorraine  is  the  dream  of 
many  Frenchmen  to-day.  The  provinces  themselves  are  still 
loyal  to  the  French,  and  it  is  said  that  if  a  visitor  asks  a 
peasant  girl  there  to-day  to  what  country  she  belongs,  she 
will  look  cautiously  round  to  see  that  no  one  is  listening  and 
then  whisper  eagerly  '  France.'  But  one  great  result  of  the 
Franco-Prussian  War  was,  that  now  at  last  France  became  a 
republic  and  has  been  one  ever  since.  After  nearly  a  hundred 
years  the  freedom  which  the  first  leaders  of  the  Revolution  of 
1789  had  longed  for,  and  which  had  caused  so  much  suffer- 
ing to  France  and  to  Europe,  was  won. 

At  the  same  time  the  war  made  Germany  a  nation. 
While  the  Prussian  king  was  at  the  palace  of  Versailles, 
where  he  stayed  during  the  siege  of  Paris,  news  came  that 


502  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

the  people  of  the  German  states  had  made  up  their  minds  to 
unite  in  one  empire,  and  King  William  i.  of  Prussia  became 
the  first  Emperor  of  Germany.  Each  state  still  governs 
itself,  and  has  its  own  prince  and  its  own  court,  but  in  all 
things  connected  with  war,  and  peace,  and  trade  the  govern- 
ment of  the  Emperor  decides  for  all.  So  after  many  centuries 
the  German  states,  which  had  remained  separate  since  the 
Middle  Ages,  became  at  last  a  nation. 

The  Making  of  Italy 

Meanwhile  Italy,  that  other  country  which  had  been  for  so 
long  broken  up  and  in  the  power  of  other  peoples,  was  becom- 
ing a  nation  too.  Early  in  the  nineteenth  century  the  same 
longing  for  freedom  which  had  begun  to  spread  through  the 
other  countries  of  Europe  was  felt  in  Italy  too.  Young  men 
like  Joseph  Mazzini,  the  first  great  hero  of  Italian  independ- 
ence, longed  to  see  their  country  freed  from  the  foreigner 
and  united  as  one  nation.  His  one  thought  was  the  sorrows 
of  Italy.  He  always  wore  black  clothes  to  show  how  he 
mourned  for  her.  A  society  was  formed  of  Italians  who 
would  work  for  their  country's  freedom.  It  was  called 
'  Young  Italy,'  and  its  watchword  was,  '  God  and  the 
People.' 

After  the  Revolution  of  1830  some  of  the  Italians  rose, 
but  only  a  few,  and  they  were  easily  put  down.  Before  this, 
Mazzini  had  gone  into  exile  after  being  in  prison  for  some 
months,  for  '  Young  Italy '  was  a  secret  society  and  it  had 
been  found  out  that  he  belonged  to  it.  He  went  like  so 
many  exiles  to  England,  where  he  stayed  until  a  new  move- 
ment began  in  Italy,  after  the  Revolution  in  France  in  1848. 
All  North  Italy  rose  against  Austria,  and  Mazzini  went  to 
Rome  and  set  up  a  republic. 

The  Pope,  Pius  ix.,  had  at  first  been  very  much  in 
sympathy  with  the  idea  of  the  liberty  of  the  people,  but 
had  afterwards  become  frightened  at  the  violence  of  some 


THE  REMAKING  OF  EUROPE  503 

of  the  leaders.  He  now  fled  from  Rome.  But  in  the 
north,  Austria  brought  a  great  army  and  defeated  the 
Italians,  and  Prince  Louis  Napoleon  brought  an  army  of 
Frenchmen  and  won  back  Rome  for  the  Pope,  in  spite  of  the 
splendid  fighting  of  Garibaldi,  another  leader  of  the  '  Young 
Italy '  movement.  He,  too,  had  been  exiled  soon  after  Mazzini, 
and  had  spent  many  years  in  war  in  South  America,  until  he 
also  came  back  to  Italy,  when  he  heard  that  the  people  were 
ready  to  fight  for  their  freedom. 

When,  after  weeks  of  fighting,  he  was  at  last  driven  from 
Rome,  he  fled  with  his  wife  Anita,  whom  he  dearly  loved, 
trying  to  reach  Venice,  but  could  not  do  so,  and  he  was 
hunted  from  place  to  place,  over  mountains  and  through 
forests  until  his  wife  died  worn  out.  At  last  he  got  away 
to  America,  where  he  stayed  until  ten  years  later  Italy  made 
a  last  and  successful  attempt  to  win  its  freedom. 

Many  of  the  leaders  of  the  '  Young  Italy '  movement 
would  have  liked  to  have  made  an  Italian  republic,  but  they 
hoped  to  get  help  from  the  other  countries  of  Europe,  and 
they  knew  they  would  only  get  it  if  they  tried  to  set  up  a 
kingdom,  and  not  a  republic.  If  they  had  won  in  their  rising 
in  1849,  Charles  Albert  of  Sardinia  was  to  have  been  ruler  of 
the  lands  conquered  from  Austria,  but  Austria  forced  Charles 
Albert  to  abdicate  and  his  son  Victor  Emmanuel  became 
King  of  Sardinia.  Charles  Albert  went  into  exile,  and  died 
without  knowing  that  success  was  to  come  and  that  his  son 
was  to  be  king  of  all  Italy. 

Victor  Emmanuel  had  for  his  chief  statesman  Cavour,  the 
third  great  leader  in  winning  the  freedom  of  Italy.  He  saw 
that  Italy  could  only  conquer  Austria  if  she  were  helped  by 
other  countries.  In  1859  a  French  army  under  Napoleon  iii. 
marched  into  Italy  to  help  Cavour  against  Austria.  Nearly 
all  Lombardy  was  won  by  them,  and  then  Napoleon,  who 
thought  he  had  done  enough,  made  peace  with  the  Austrians. 
This  would  have  left  Venice  and  other  parts  of  North  Italy  to 
them,  but  Cavour  was  terribly  angry  at  Napoleon's  behaviour. 


504 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


and  the  people  of  North  Italy  all  wanted  Victor  Emmanuel 
for  their  king. 

Garibaldi  helped  in  the  struggle,  a  dark  fierce  man  in  the 
famous  red  shirt  which  he  always  wore.  At  last  all  of  North 
Italy,  except  Venice,  belonged  to  Victor  Emmanuel.  There 
were   still   the    Papal    States,   Naples    and    Sicily,   to    win. 

Garibaldi  begged  of  the  North  Italians 
for  money  to  get  men  and  weapons  to 
fight  against  the  King  of  Naples,  who 
was  of  course  a  foreigner  belonging 
to  the  French  royal  family.  Garibaldi 
took  his  men  to  Sicily  and  called  on  the 
peasants  to  rise.  The  islanders  rose  and 
drove  the  Neapolitan  officers  away. 
Sicily  was  won  for  Victor  Emmanuel. 

Then  the  leader  crossed  to  Naples ; 
the  royal  family  fled  and  the  people 
followed  Garibaldi.  But  at  the  royal 
palace  there  were  still  royal  troops. 
They  might  at  any  moment  have 
fired,  but  Garibaldi  stood  up  in  his 
carriage  looking  steadily  at  them.  Then 
they,  too,  gave  way  to  the  enthusiasm 
of  the  people  for  '  Young  Italy.'  Great 
cries  of  '  Viva  Garibaldi ! '  ('  Long  live 
Garibaldi ! ')  were  heard  on  every  side, 
and  Naples  was  won  also  for  Victor 
Emmanuel.  The  greater  part  of  the  Papal  States  had  been 
taken  too.  All  Italy  except  Rome  was  now  joined  under 
one  ruler  for  the  first  time  since  the  fall  of  the  Roman 
Empire.  In  1870,  when  France  being  at  war  could  no  longer 
send  an  army  to  defend  the  Pope,  Rome  was  taken  too,  and 
became  the  capital  of  the  new  kingdom. 

An  offer  was  made  to  the  Pope  to  pay  him  yearly  a 
large  sum  of  money.  He  was  to  have  his  court  like  a 
king,  and   his   soldiers,  but   he  was   not   to   rule   over  any 


GARIBALDI,    THE    ITALIAN 
PATRIOT 

(From  his  statue  at  Florence). 


THE  REMAKING  OF  EUROPE  505 

part  of  the  land.  But  the  Pope  would  not  agree  to  this. 
He  still  lives  in  his  palace  of  the  Vatican,  but  has  never 
given  his  consent  to  the  loss  of  the  Papal  States.  This 
question  of  the  *  Temporal  Power,'  as  the  Pope's  rule  over 
the  Papal  States  was  called,  is  still  discussed  among  Catholics 
to-day.  There  are  many  who  think  that  the  Pope  can  rule 
better  and  more  spiritually  over  the  Church  now  that  he 
is  no  longer  a  temporal  prince,  but  others  think  that  he  has 
been  robbed  of  his  rights.  Especially  in  Roman  society  does 
the  quarrel  go  on.  The  people  are  divided  between  the 
Whites,'  who  are  all  for  the  Pope,  and  the  '  Blacks,'  who 
are  in  favour  of  the  king.  Meanwhile  the  royal  and  papal 
courts  go  on  side  by  side.  Certainly  it  would  have  been 
impossible  for  the  great  dream  of  Italian  unity  to  come  true 
if  the  temporal  power  had  been  kept. 

And  so  now  at  last  all  Europe  was  divided  into  nations, 
and  all  had  '  constitutions  '  more  or  less  free,  except  the  one 
country  of  Russia.  Nowhere  any  longer  were  there  serfs, 
except  indeed  in  Russia  until  1861,  when  there,  too,  the  Tsar 
set  them  free.  But  in  Russia  alone  there  is  very  little  freedom 
of  government  yet.  The  Tsar  is  as  absolute  as  any  king 
before  the  French  Revolution,  or  more  so.  There  is  no  free- 
dom of  the  Press  in  Russia  and  no  freedom  of  thought.  For 
years  all  men  or  women  who  have  dared  to  speak  against  the 
government  have  been  sent  as  prisoners  to  Siberia,  that  great 
tract  of  land  stretching  across  the  north  of  Asia  which  Russia 
won  in  the  sixteenth  century.  There  the  exiles  used  to  be 
driven  in  crowds,  marching  in  chains  for  thousands  of  miles  to 
the  prisons  they  were  never  more  to  leave.  Prisoners  are  still 
sent  to  Siberia,  but  they  go  by  the  wonderful  Trans-Siberian 
Railway,  which  stretches  from  Europe  to  the  Pacific  Ocean. 
Many  Russian  exiles  are  to  be  found  in  all  the  countries  of 
Europe,  waiting  and  hoping  till  their  country  too  shall  be  free. 
There  are  some  who  have  grown  desperate  and  would  destroy 
all  governments  if  they  could. 

Everywhere   else   the  peoples   of  Europe   are  free,  and 


506  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

so,  too,  in  America  and  Africa  and  Australia.  At  the  be- 
ginning of  the  nineteenth  century  all  South  America, 
except  two  little  districts  in  the  north  which  belonged  to 
England,  were  under  Spain  and  Portugal.  The  people 
were  partly  Spanish  and  Portuguese,  but  there  were  many 
more  natives,  and  many,  too,  '  half-breeds,'  or  *  Creoles,^ 
people  descended  from  Spaniards  who  had  married  natives. 
When  the  United  States  won  their  freedom  from  England 
and  the  news  of  the  French  Revolution  reached  South 
America,  ideas  of  revolution  began  to  spread  through  South 
America  too.  Then  when  the  Spanish  and  Portuguese  kings 
were  deposed  by  Napoleon,  the  South  Americans  hardly  knew 
who  were  supposed  to  be  their  rulers.  This  encouraged  the 
ideas  of  independence  which  were  already  spreading.  The 
Portuguese  royal  family  fled  to  Brazil,  but  soon  after  they  had 
returned  to  Portugal  Brazil  became  a  separate  state  with  a 
Portuguese  prince  as  its  constitutional  emperor.  At  last,  in 
1889,  Brazil  became  a  republic. 

But  things  were  not  done  so  peacefully  in  the  greater  part 
of  South  America  which  belonged  to  Spain.  In  these  pro- 
vinces there  were  many  royalists  as  well  as  republicans,  and 
there  were  many  bitter  struggles  before  the  republicans  won. 
One  of  the  great  heroes  of  the  struggle  was  a  man  named  San 
Martin.  For  four  years  he  fought  against  the  royalists  in 
the  rich  country  round  La  Plata,  the  great  '  silver '  river,  but 
in  1816  he  was  able  to  set  up  the  republic  of  Argentina. 
Then  Chili  arose,  but  the  royalists  of  Peru  defeated  the  re- 
publicans there.  There  were  many  strange  people  in  South 
America,  and  the  leader  of  the  Chilians  was  an  Irishman 
named  O'Higgins.  But  San  Martin  marched  to  his  help 
across  the  great  mountain  range  of  the  Andes,  and  Chili,  too,, 
won  its  independence.  After  many  bitter  struggles,  Vene- 
zuela also  won  its  freedom,  though  it  was  twice  won  back 
again,  and  then  Bolivar,  the  hero  of  Venezuela,  joined  with 
San  Martin  to  win  Peru. 

At  last   Spanish   South  America  was   divided   into  nine 


GtORGE  PH  LPS.  SON  LTD 


TH£  LONDON  ttOGRAPHICAL   INSTITUTf 


SOUTH    AMERICA 


508  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

republics.  At  first  they  were  often  governed  by  dictators, 
soldiers  who  had  helped  to  win  their  freedom  for  them ;  but 
in  the  end  they  all  became  really  free  republics,  and  South 
America  rapidly  became  rich  and  strong.  So  here,  too,  the 
work  of  the  French  Revolution  spread. 

And  now  even  the  peoples  of  Asia  are  waking  up  to  the 
idea  of  freedom,  and  we  may  hope  that  before  long  all  the 
peoples  of  the  earth  will  have  their  liberty. 


CHAPTER    XLVI 

AFRICA— THE  LAND  OF  MYSTERY 

Meanwhile   another   vast   land   was    becoming   of   greater 
importance  in  the  world's  history. 

Africa  as  we  know  it  to-day  can  only  look  back  on  a 
history  of  about  forty  years.  Within  that  time  the  nations 
of  Europe  have  agreed  to  cut  it  up  into  pieces,  in  each  of 
which  some  European  nation  rules.  Of  all  that  vast  conti- 
nent only  two  states  are  ruled  by  natives,  the  republic  of 
Liberia  and  Abyssinia.  Liberia  is  the  place  where  slaves 
who  had  been  set  free  were  allowed  to  settle  down  and  begin 
their  lives  over  again  in  freedom.  From  1821  up  to  about 
fifty  years  ago  ships  sailed  across  the  ocean  from  America, 
bringing  hundreds  of  old  negro  men  and  women  and  children 
to  their  new  home  in  that  Africa  from  which  their  forefathers 
had  been  stolen  so  many  years  before. 

The  other  native  state,  Abyssinia,  is  much  older,  and  one 
of  their  old  stories  says  that  the  Queen  of  Sheba'^who  visited 
King  Solomon  was  a  queen  of  Abyssinia.  Since  the  struggle 
with  Italy,  which  ended  in  the  terrible  defeat  of  the  Italians 
in  1896,  no  one  has  tried  to  rob  the  Abyssinians  of  their 
independence. 

In  the  rest  of  Africa,  Germany  and  Portugal  each  have 
two  pieces  south  of  the  Equator,  one  on  the  east  and  one  on 
the  west  side.  Between  them  are  the  South  African  Union 
and  other  states  under  Great  Britain.  At  Lake  Tanganyika, 
where  this  country  ends,  is  the  Congo  Free  State,  which 
belongs  to  Belgium.  North  of  the  Equator  Great  Britain 
has  British  East  Africa  and  Uganda,  stretching  up  to  Egypt, 

509 


510  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

to  the  west  of  which  is  the  huge  desert  land  reaching  to  the 
west  coast  and  belonging  to  France.  Morocco,  Algeria  and 
Tunis  are  also  under  France,  Tripoli  and  the  westerly  part  of 
Africa  under  Italy,  while  there  are  other  strips  of  land  on  the 
west  coast  belonging  to  France,  Great  Britain  and  Germany. 
We  must  now  see  how  all  these  lands  came  to  be  ruled  by  the 
nations  of  Europe. 

Although  the  continent  of  Africa  is  about  three  times  as 
large  as  Europe,  and  nearly  two  hundred  times  the  size  of 
England  and  Wales,  and  has  a  huge  number  of  people  living 
in  it,  it  is  a  land  of  mystery.  Part  of  it,  indeed,  is  called  the 
'  Dark  Continent ' ;  but  in  many  ways  the  whole  is  dark. 
There  is  so  little  known  of  it — so  much  that  can  never  be 
known.  The  people  who  first  Uved  in  Africa  were  probably 
a  small  black  race,  and  many  of  this  sort  of  people  still  live 
in  the  part  of  Africa  farthest  from  the  sea. 

The  parts  we  know  best  are  the  parts  near  the  sea. 
Besides  Egypt,  the  Northern  sea  states — Morocco,  Tunis  and 
Tripoli,  which  were  called  'Barbary '  from  the  '  Barber  '  people 
who  live  there — were  the  only  places  which  people  knew  much 
about  before  the  sixteenth  century.  We  have  seen  how  the 
Arabs  conquered  Egypt  in  the  seventh  century,  and  then 
pushed  their  way  along  the  North  African  coastlands  and  on 
into  Spain.  But  after  the  Moorish  power  was  ended  in  Spain, 
Barbary,  except  Morocco,  was  taken  by  the  Spaniards  at  the 
beginning  of  the  sixteenth  century.  But  it  never  really 
became  Spanish,  and  almost  immediately  afterwards  Algeria, 
Tunis  and  Tripoli  were  taken  by  the  Turks,  who  had  also  now 
conquered  Egypt.  Morocco  alone  remained  independent, 
and  some  of  the  Moors  from  that  state  journeyed  south  as  far 
as  Timbuktu. 

The  Barbary  Pirates 

But  the  Turks  have  always  seemed  to  stop  the  growth  of 
the  lands  they  have  conquered,  and  the  only  thing  that  shows 
that  these  states  were  aUve  until  the  nineteenth  century  was 


AFRICA— THE  LAND  OF  MYSTERY        511 

the  bands  of  pirates  who  sailed  out  in  their  swift  low  boats 
and  attacked  any  ship  which  was  not  well  protected  with 
guns.  The  pirates  were  quite  fearless,  and  even  when  the 
French  and  English  joined  against  them  they  could  not 
conquer  them  at  first.  They  were  not  always  only  people 
from  Barbary.  Men  from  European  countries  joined  them, 
too,  now  and  then.  They  not  only  attacked  ships  ;  sometimes 
they  would  swoop  down  on  a  town,  kill  w^hoever  tried  to  resist 
them,  and  carry  other  people  off  and  sell  them  as  slaves,  or 
make  their  friends  buy  them  back  for  immense  ransoms. 
They  often  attacked  Spain  and  Sicily  and  parts  of  Italy,  but 
even  got  as  far  as  Ireland  sometimes. 

Of  course  if  the  nations  of  Europe  had  really  joined  to 
conquer  them  they  could  have  done  so,  but  they  did  not. 
Tunis  was  really  a  pirate  state,  and  pirates  ruled  the  chief 
coast  towns  of  all  these  states.  Twice  in  the  nineteenth 
century  a  British  fleet  attacked  Algiers,  which  was  one  of 
their  chief  strongholds ;  but  they  were  not  really  put  down 
until  France  conquered  first  Algeria  and  then  Tunis.  France 
now  really  rules  both  of  these  states,  though  there  is  a  native 
ruler  in  Tunisia  who  governs  under  the  French.  The  French 
power  has  in  the  last  few  years  been  recognised  as  the  chief  in 
Morocco,  though  Spain  is  allowed  to  govern  certain  parts. 
For  many  years  in  the  last  century  several  European  nations 
wanted  to  be  the  chief  power  in  Morocco,  and  Germany  was 
the  last  to  agree  to  the  French  ruling  there.  In  1912  the 
Italians  invaded  Tripoli  and  took  it  from  the  Turkish  rulers 
after  some  fierce  fighting. 

Egypt 

Egypt  has  had  quite  a  different  past  from  the  Barbary 
States.  When  the  Arabs  took  Egypt  it  was  at  first  ruled  by 
governors  sent  by  the  Caliphs,  but  in  time  the  governors  passed 
on  their  power  to  their  sons  and  became  the  real  rulers  of 
the  country  independent  of  the  Caliphs.       Saladin,  against 


512  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

whom  Richard  i.  fought  in  the  Crusades,  was  one  of  these 
rulers  of  Egypt. 

Many  other  rulers  came  after  Saladin,  but  they  were  often 
weak  men,  and  in  1517  the  Turks  conquered  Egypt,  and  they 
kept  it  till  Napoleon's  famous  attack  on  Egypt  in  1798. 

Some  years  before  this,  however,  a  Scotsman  named 
James  Bruce,  who  had  had  a  life  filled  with  strange  adventures, 
had  travelled  through  Egypt.  He  had  spent  two  years  at 
the  court  of  the  pirate  rulers  of  Algiers,  and  he  then  travelled 
through  Tunis  to  Tripoli.  He  took  ships  to  the  island  of  Crete, 
but  was  wrecked  and  had  to  swim  back  to  the  African  shore. 
He  had  made  up  his  mind  to  see  where  the  Nile,  the  great 
river  of  Egypt,  began. 

It  was  not  an  easy  thing  he  had  set  himself  to  do.  But  he 
had  many  things  in  his  favour.  He  was  used  to  danger.  He 
was  taller  and  bigger  than  most  men,  very  strong,  and  very 
good  at  sports.  He  knew  several  languages  well,  and  also  had 
a  little  knowledge  of  how  to  cure  diseases.  He  arrived  in 
Alexandria  in  1768,  and  was  able  to  make  friends  with  the 
ruler  of  Egypt.  The  country  was  filled  with  wild  men,  but 
Bruce  went  among  them  without  fear.  He  saw  the  old 
Egyptian  city  of  Thebes,  and  went  across  the  desert  to  Arabia 
dressed  as  a  Turkish  soldier.  Then  he  returned  and  went  to 
Abyssinia,  where  every  one  was  kind  to  him.  He  stayed  there 
two  years.  The  King  of  Abyssinia  did  not  want  him  to  go 
away,  but  at  last  allowed  him  to,  and  then  Bruce  travelled  to 
the  place  where — not  the  Nile,  but — the  '  Blue  Nile  '  begins. 
He  had  done  a  great  deal,  but  he  had  not  done  what  he  thought. 
The  White  Nile  is  really  the  Nile  of  the  ancient  peoples,  and 
although  he  did  not  find  its  source  he  travelled  still  further 
across  the  desert  and  found  the  place  where  the  Blue  Nile  joins 
the  White  Nile,  a  place  which  British  people  ^ill  always 
remember,  for  there  stands  Khartum,  where  General  Gordon 
died. 

Poor  Bruce,  after  all  his  hardships,  found  that  people  would 
not  believe  his  story  when  he  got  back  to  London.     Even 


English  Milss 


O  500  lOOO 

MODERN    AFRICA 


2    K 


514  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

when  he  wrote  all  his  adventures  down  in  a  book  many  people 
still  refused  to  believe  him.  He  went  back  very  sad  to 
his  home  in  Scotland.  But  now  we  know  that  all  he  said  was 
true. 

The  End  of  Egypt's  Independence 

Napoleon's  soldiers  did  not  stay  long  in  Egypt.  They 
were  driven  out  by  the  English  and  the  Turks,  and  then 
Mehemet  Ali  made  himself  ruler.  He  was  terribly  cruel,  and 
when  a  British  army  fought  against  him  he  cut  off  the  heads 
of  the  soldiers  and  stuck  them  on  pieces  of  wood  in  Alexandria. 
The  strange  thing  is  that  after  beginning  his  rule  with  so  much 
cruelty  he  really  became  a  good  ruler,  and  when  he  died  in 
1848  all  the  land  along  the  Nile  and  the  roads  by  which  people 
travelled  were  quite  safe  even  for  Christians. 

It  was  through  the  grandson  of  Mehemet  Ali,  Ismail,  that 
Egypt  lost  its  independence.  He  had  been  to  school  in  France, 
and  had  there  learned  many  new  ways  of  obtaining  and  spend- 
ing money.  Eastern  people  are  generally  extravagant ;  but 
Ismail  had  become  worse  through  his  life  in  Paris.  He  found 
that  it  was  easy  for  a  country  to  borrow  money,  and  so  he  got 
as  much  as  he  could.  He  borrowed  so  much  and  so  often  that 
at  last  the  great  countries  of  Europe  saw  that  they  must 
interfere  if  Egypt  was  ever  to  pay  its  debts. 

But  before  this  Ismail  had  done  many  good  things  for 
Egypt.  He  got  Englishmen  to  teach  the  Egyptians  new 
ways,  and  letters  were  sent  by  post  for  the  first  time  in  the 
history  of  Egypt.  He  built  railways,  lighthouses  and  tele- 
graphs ;  and  the  great  canal  at  Suez,  through  which  ships  sail 
on  their  way  to  India  and  Australia,  was  opened  in  1869,  six 
years  after  he  began  to  rule. 

In  1875  Egypt  was  in  a  very  bad  state.  Ismail  had  no 
money,  and  no  one  would  lend  him  any  more.  So  he  sold  his 
part  of  the  profits  in  the  Suez  Canal  to  Great  Britain.  This 
made  England  take  an  interest  in  Egyptian  money  matters, 
and  when  the  men  who  were  sent  to  find  out  how  Ismail  was 


AFRICA— THE  LAND  OF  MYSTERY        515 

spending  his  money  told  how  great  his  debts  were,  an  English- 
man was  put  to  see  to  the  collection  of  all  the  taxes,  and  a 
Frenchman  to  see  that  the  money  was  spent  wisely.  After 
three  years  Ismail  tried  secretly  to  stir  up  rebellions  in  Cairo, 
and  then  the  English  and  French  asked  the  Sultan  of  Turkey, 
who  was  supposed  to  be  Ismail's  king,  to  appoint  another  ruler 
for  Egypt.  This  the  Sultan  did  at  once,  and  England  and 
France  helped  the  new  ruler  to  govern  Egypt  until  the  Arab 
soldiers  rose  in  rebellion.  The  British  fleet  then  attacked 
Alexandria  in  1882,  and  the  Enghsh,  seeing  that  they  could 
not  conquer  the  rebellious  Arabs  in  this  way  alone,  made  up 
their  minds  to  send  soldiers  to  Egypt.  France  refused  to  send 
any  and  so  did  Italy ;  and  British  soldiers  had  to  do  the  work 
alone.  England  in  this  way  came  to  be  the  only  nation  to 
help  the  Khedive,  as  the  ruler  of  Egypt  is  called,  to  govern  in 
peace.  Sir  Evelyn  Baring,  who  is  now  Lord  Cromer,  was  the 
Englishman  sent  out  to  represent  Great  Britain  in  1884,  and 
until  a  few  years  ago  he  remained  in  Egypt.  He  was  so  wise 
that  law  and  order  are  everywhere  now  in  Egypt,  and  the 
country  is  rich  and  prosperous. 

General  Gordon 

But  many  Englishmen  have  lost  their  lives  in  making 
Egypt  a  greater  and  better  state.  The  most  famous  of  these 
was  General  Gordon.  He  had  fought  in  the  Crimean  War 
and  in  China  before  he  was  sent  to  Egypt,  in  1874,  to  act  as 
governor  for  the  Khedive  in  the  land  to  the  south.  He  went 
at  once  to  the  country  he  was  to  rule,  and  worked  hard  for  six 
years  putting  down  the  slave  trade,  drawing  maps  of  the 
unknown  country  and  learning  to  know  the  strange  peoples 
of  the  desert.  He  succeeded  in  this  so  well  that  he  could 
make  these  people  do  things  which  no  one  else  could  persuade 
them  to  do.     He  was  always  in  great  danger. 

Once  a  rebellion  broke  out  at  a  place  called  Darfur,  and 
Gordon  went  as  fast  as  he  could  to  put  it  down.     He  had 


516 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


only  a  few  soldiers,  and  when  he  came  near  to  the  rebels  he 
left  his  soldiers  behind  and  went  with  only  one  man  to  speak 
to  the  rebels.  This  man  he  took  because  he  did  not  know 
the  language  of  these  people.  After  he  had  spoken  to  them 
for  a  little  time  the  rebels  went  quietly  away.  He  tried  to 
make  peace  in  a  war  between  Egypt  and  Abyssinia,  but  was 
taken  prisoner.    During  each  of  the  last  three  years  of  his  rule 

he  had  to  ride  about  three  thou- 
sand miles  on  camels  or  mules, 
and  he  was  quite  tired  out  when 
he  gave  up  his  command  in  1880. 
He  spent  a  short  time  in  South 
Africa,  paid  a  visit  to  Palestine, 
and  then  at  the  beginning  of 
1884  was  asked  by  the  British 
government  to  go  out  to  Egypt 
once  more. 

When  Gordon  left  Egypt  a 
man  whom  he  had  once  had  to 
send  away  for  ruhng  badly  under 
him  had  been  made  governor  of 
the  Sudan,  as  the  country  south 
of  Egypt  is  called.  Soon  his  unjust  rule  made  people  very 
angry,  and  an  Egyptian  who  had  been  ill-treated  now  rose  and 
got  the  people  to  rebel.  He  said  that  he  himself  was  the 
'  Mahdi,'  the  successor  of  Mahommed.  A  large  army  was  sent 
to  fight  against  him,  but  it  was  defeated,  and  hundreds  and 
hundreds  of  soldiers  were  killed.  Soon  the  Mahdi  became 
master  of  nearly  the  whole  of  the  Sudan  except  Khartum,  and 
Great  Britain  advised  the  Khedive  to  give  up  the  Sudan 
altogether.  Gordon  was  sent  to  see  how  the  soldiers  in  the  forts 
scattered  over  the  Sudan  could  be  got  away  to  Egypt  wdthout 
being  killed  by  the  Mahdi.  He  arrived  at  Khartum  on  the 
18th  of  February,  and  all  the  natives  welcomed  him,  thinking 
that  he  had  come  to  deliver  them  from  the  Mahdi.  Soon 
the    soldiers   of  the    Mahdi  surrounded   Khartum,   but   not 


'\>t^.^ttiy,v;'5i*!;(7!r 


GENERAL    GORDON 


AFRICA— THE  LAND  OF  MYSTERY        517 

before    Gordon   had    got  the   women    and    children    safely 
away. 

There  had  been  an  army  not  far  off  at  Suakin,  but  it  was 
taken  away,  and  the  forts  north  of  Khartum  were  taken,  so 
Gordon  was  cut  off  from  all  help.  He  had  only  one  other 
white  man  with  him.  The  rest  were  natives.  There  was 
not  much  food  in  Khartum,  and  the  fort  was  not  built  to 
stand  against  a  strong  attack.  Yet  the  months  dragged  on, 
and  still  he  would  not  surrender.  There  alone  in  the  midst 
of  the  desert,  among  men  of  a  different  race  and  religion,  he 
held  out,  doing,  as  he  said,  '  the  best  for  the  honour  of  his 
country,'  waiting  and  hoping  that  help  would  come. 

On  the  5th  of  January  1885  the  last  morsel  of  food  was 
eaten,  and  the  starving  men  grew  weaker  day  by  day,  but 
would  not  give  in.  But  the  waters  of  the  Nile  had  risen  and 
broken  one  of  the  walls,  and  when  the  Mahdi  and  his  followers 
rushed  in  on  26th  January  the  men  were  too  weak  to  resist. 
Gordon  and  many  others  were  killed.  '  I  am  quite  happy, 
thank  God,'  he  had  written  in  a  letter  which  he  left  behind 
for  his  sister ;  *  I  have  tried  to  do  my  duty.' 

Two  days  after  his  death  the  help  he  had  hoped  for 
arrived,  but  it  was  too  late,  and  many  long  years  were  to  pass 
before  the  Egyptian  army,  trained  and  drilled  by  British 
officers  and  helped  by  British  soldiers,  was  to  avenge  the 
death  of  Gordon.  Little  by  little  this  army  was  built  up ; 
step  by  step  it  marched  forward  into  the  Sudan  until  Sir 
Herbert  (now  Lord)  Kitchener  felt  that  it  was  strong  enough 
to  attack  the  Mahdi's  stronghold  at  Omdurman,  two  miles 
north  of  Khartum.  The  followers  of  the  Mahdi  fought  so 
bravely  that  ten  thousand  Avere  killed  before  they  gave  in ; 
but  at  last  the  black  flag  which  used  to  fly  at  Omdurman  was 
captured  and  sent  home  to  Queen  Victoria.  The  Mahdi's 
power  was  destroyed  for  ever.  This  was  in  1898.  On 
Sunday,  4th  September,  two  days  after  the  victory.  General 
Kitchener,  with  a  man  from  each  regiment,  crossed  the  Nile 
to  Khartum,  hoisted  the  flags  of  Great  Britain  and  Egypt, 


\- 


518  THE  STOKY  OF  THE  WORLD 

and  held  a  service  in  memory  of  General  Gordon  on  the  spot 
where  he  died. 

Since  then  Egypt  has  grown  still  more  prosperous  under 
the  direction  of  Great  Britain.  A  university  was  founded  at 
Khartum  a  few  years  ago,  and  the  place  which  was  the  scene 
of  so  terrible  a  tragedy  is  now  a  peaceful  and  prosperous 
town.  Lord  Cromer  resigned  his  position  as  representative 
of  Great  Britain  in  1907,  and  now  Lord  Kitchener,  who  did 
so  much  to  give  Egypt  peace  and  safety,  has  taken  his  place. 

The  Explorers 

So  far  only  a  fringe  of  Africa  has  been  mentioned.  The 
story  of  the  rest  of  this  huge  continent  is  chiefly  the  story  of 
the  brave  men  who  spent  their  lives  in  trying  to  learn 
something  of  its  mystery.  It  is  strange  to  think  that  the 
explorers  who  have  discovered  what  is  known  about  Africa 
nearly  all,  and  certainly  all  the  greatest,  lived  within  the  last 
hundred  years.  It  is  true  that  in  the  fifteenth  century  the  brave 
Portuguese  sailor,  Bartholomew  Diaz,  sailed  round  the  Cape 
of  Good  Hope  and  stopped  at  many  places  on  the  coast,  and 
Portuguese  missionaries  made  their  way  into  Abyssinia. 
And  it  is  also  true  that  the  Dutch,  two  centuries  later, 
settkd  in  Cape  Town.  But  behind  these  coast  lands  lay  the 
'  Dark  Continent '  about  which  the  people  of  Europe  knew 
nothing  until  the  nineteenth  century. 

MuNGo  Park 

One  of  the  first  explorers  to  go  to  Africa  was  a  young 
Scottish  doctor  named  Mungo  Park.  It  was  only  a  year  after 
the  death  of  Bruce,  who  discovered  the  source  of  the  Blue 
Nile,  that  Mungo  Park  started  out  to  follow  the  course  of  the 
Niger,  a  river  of  West  Africa.  He  reached  the  Gambia 
river,  and  having  anchored  his  ship  as  far  up  as  he  could  sail, 
he  set  out  on  horseback  with  a  negro  servant  and  a  slave  boy. 


yf 


AFRICA— THE  LAND  OF  MYSTERY         519 

The  natives  warned  him  not  to  travel  into  the  desert,  but  he 
went  on.  He  had  to  make  friends  with  the  native  chiefs 
whom  he  met.  Once  he  had  to  give  up  his  best  coat  because 
a  chief  liked  the  yellow  buttons  so  much.  He  travelled 
through  part  of  the  country  where  war  was  going  on,  and 
the  negro  servant  ran  away.  Mungo  Park  was  taken  prisoner 
and  badly  treated,  but  at  last  got  away.  But  he  had  no  food  or 
drink.  When  he  thought  he  must  surely  die  he  came  at  last 
to  *  the  long-sought  majestic  Niger  glittering  in  the  morning 
sun.'  He  travelled  still  further,  but  he  was  nearly  dead  from 
hunger  and  from  the  suffering  caused  by  the  bites  of 
mosquitoes,  and  so  he  sadly  turned  back. 

He  had  followed  the  great  river  three  hundred  miles,  and 
after  a  few  years  in  England  he  went  out  again.  Once  more 
he  had  to  go  through  terrible  sufferings.  He  started  with  a 
good  many  men  this  time,  but  many  died,  and  with  only 
seven  left  he  went  on,  determined  '  to  discover  the  termination 
of  the  Niger  or  perish  in  the  attempt.'  His  end  was  very 
sad.  The  little  party  was  sailing  down  a  river  when  they 
saw  the  whole  bank  covered  with  natives  who  shot  arrows 
and  threw  spears  at  them,  and  all  but  one  man,  seeing  no  way 
of  escape,  jumped  overboard  and  were  drowned. 

David  Livingstone 

It  was  thirty- six  years  before  the  next  great  explorer 
went  to  Africa.  This  was  David  Livingstone,  who  was  also 
a  Scotsman  like  Mungo  Park.  He  had  had  a  hard  time  as 
a  boy.  He  left  school  when  he  was  only  ten  years  old,  and 
worked  for  many  years  in  a  cotton  mill  before  he  was  able  to 
go  to  college,  to  study  to  become  a  missionary.  He  wished 
to  go  to  China,  but  when  he  had  studied  for  a  long  time,  and 
had  become  a  doctor,  he  was  sent  out  to  Africa.  This  was  in 
1841.  He  was  twenty-eight  years  old  then,  and  a  strange 
man  to  look  at.  He  looked  rough,  but  he  was  really  very 
gentle,   and  he   was  always  bubbling  over  with   fun.      He 


520  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

travelled  great  distances  on  his  first  journey,  his  winning 
manner  helping  him  to  make  friends  with  the  natives,  and  he 
soon  made  up  his  mind  that  he  could  do  most  good  by 
travelling  as  far  as  possible,  and  handing  over  the  knowledge 
he  had  won  for  others  to  follow.  He  had  not  been  in  Africa 
very  long  before  he  was  attacked  by  a  lion,  which  crushed  his 
arm  so  that  it  never  really  got  well. 

He  got  married  in  Africa  and  still  continued  his  journeys. 
Sometimes  he  stayed  a  little  time  in  one  place,  and  once 
after  he  had  done  this  the  whole  tribe  of  people  followed  him 
when  he  went  away,  because  they  loved  him  so  much.  In 
1849  he  crossed  the  great  Kalahari  desert,  and  reached  Lake 
Ngami,  which  he  was  the  first  white  man  to  see.  This  was 
only  one  of  the  many  discoveries  he  made.  He  reached  the 
Zambesi  river  in  1851,  and  later  on  he  made  up  his  mind  to 
follow  it,  see  where  it  began,  and  wliere  it  entered  the  sea. 

It  is  impossible  to  tell  of  all  his  journeyings,  how  he 
crossed  Africa  to  the  Portuguese  town  Loanda  on  the  west, 
and  then  followed  the  Zambesi  right  to  the  east  coast.  When 
he  reached  Loanda  he  was  nearly  dead.  He  had  suffered 
terribly  from  fever,  and  for  many  days  had  had  hardly  any- 
thing to  eat.  After  a  short  rest  he  set  oif  again,  always  writ- 
ing down  carefully  what  he  had  found  out,  and  again  he  was 
nearly  dead  when  he  reached  another  Portuguese  town  on  the 
west.  But  he  left  his  men  there,  and  two  months  later  had 
the  joy  of  reaching  the  place  where  the  Zambesi  runs  into 
the  sea. 

After  a  year  in  England  he  went  to  Africa  again  in  1858, 
and  he  was  very  angry  when  he  saw  the  terrible  cruelties  of 
the  slave  trade.  The  Arabs  who  bought  and  sold  the  negroes 
as  slaves  treated  them  worse  than  beasts.  Livingstone  made 
up  his  mind  to  do  all  he  could  to  put  an  end  to  the  slave  trade 
in  Africa.  Wherever  he  went  he  set  the  slaves  free,  but  once 
he  had  to  stand  by  while  Arab  traders  killed  hundreds  of 
women.  He  had  lost  the  four  goats  he  had  taken  with  him, 
his  medicine  chest  M^as  stolen,  and   he  could  do  nothing  to 


A    VIEW    OF    MODERN    CAIRO    SHOWING    THE    CITADEL. 


CAPE    TOWN,    WITH    TABLE    MOUNTAIN. 


TWO    GREAT   CITIES    OF    OLD    AND    NEW   AFRICA. 
(Photos  by  Bonfils  &  Valentine.) 


AFRICA— THE  LAND  OF  MYSTERY        521 

help  himself.  He  was  not  heard  of  for  a  long  time,  and 
people  thought  that  he  must  be  dead.  So  a  brave  man  called 
Henry  Morton  Stanley  was  sent  out  by  the  owner  of  a  great 
newspaper  to  try  and  find  him.  When  Livingstone,  worn 
out,  thin  from  fever,  and  half-starved,  reached  Ujiji  on  Lake 
Tanganyika,  what  was  his  joy  to  find  Stanley  waiting  for  him 
with  food  and  medicine. 

He  seemed  to  get  new  life  from  the  meeting,  and  started 
afresh  to  find  new  places.  Stanley  had  to  leave  him  in  1872, 
and  Livingstone  was  never  seen  again  by  white  men.  He 
travelled  from  Tanganyika  to  Bangweolo.  But  there  fever 
and  the  terrible  disease  of  dysentery  came  on  again.  He 
grew  worse  and  worse,  so  that  the  natives  had  to  carry 
him.  On  27th  April  he  wrote  for  the  last  time  in  his  diary. 
On  30th  April  he  could  just  wind  his  watch,  and  the  next 
day  the  natives  found  him  kneeling  by  the  side  of  his  bed,  dead. 
They  carried  the  body  and  all  the  dead  man's  books  to  the 
coast,  w^here  they  could  give  them  into  the  keeping  of  white 
men,  for  they  were  anxious  to  do  all  they  could  to  show  their 
love  and  respect  for  their  dead  teacher.  The  body  was 
brought  to  England  and  buried  in  Westminster  Abbey. 
Stanley  went  out  to  Africa  the  next  year  and  discovered 
the  Edward  Nyanza  :  '  Nyanza  '  is  the  African  name  for  '  lake.' 
He  went  right  across  the  centre  of  the  continent. 

It  was  the  travels  of  these  brave  men  that  made  the  people 
of  Europe  begin  to  wish  to  take  the  land  of  Africa  for  them- 
selves. At  the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth  century  Great 
Britain  got  Cape  Colony  by  the  Peace  of  Paris.  It  was  a 
strange  people  the  British  had  to  rule  there.  The  Dutch 
settlers  of  the  seventeenth  century  had  married  with  French 
Huguenots,  who  came  later,  and  these  independent  and  rather 
hard  men  were  jealous  of  the  English  settlers  who  now  flocked 
to  South  Africa.  They  hated  the  English  for  putting  an  end 
to  slavery  and  the  slave  trade,  and  in  1835  a  great  number  of 
them  moved  together,  or  '  trekked,'  as  they  say  in  Africa, 
northwards  to  Natal,  where  they  founded  a  republic. 


522  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

But  not  many  years  later  Natal  was  made  a  British  colony, 
and  many  pieces  of  land  where  the  natives  were  rebellious 
were  added  to  Cape  Colony.  Others  of  the  Dutch,  or  '  Boers,' 
as  they  were  called,  when  they  settled  in  Africa,  founded  the 
Orange  Free  State,  east  of  Natal.  Great  Britain  took  that  in 
1848,  but  gave  it  back  to  the  Boers  to  rule,  six  years  later. 
Other  Boers  settled  north  of  the  Orange  Free  State  and 
founded  the  Transvaal  Republic ;  but  they  fought  so  much 
with  the  natives  that  Great  Britain  took  it  from  them  in  1877. 
This  did  not  help  the  English  very  much  for  they  had  now  to 
struggle  with  the  natives.  The  warlike  Zulus,  a  very  savage 
tribe,  rose  under  their  King  Cetchwayo,  and  after  defeating 
the  English  in  one  terrible  battle  they  were  beaten  in  1880, 
and  Zululand  was  added  to  Natal. 

This  was  a  chance  for  the  Transvaal.  They  had  been 
afraid  of  the  Zulus  before,  but  now  that  they  were  beaten,  the 
Boers  rebelled  against  the  English.  They  soon  beat  the  few 
British  soldiers  in  South  Africa.  They  had  been  fighting  for 
years  against  the  natives,  and  knew  better  than  the  English 
how  to  fight  in  that  country.  The  British  Government,  while 
new  soldiers  were  still  on  the  way  to  South  Africa,  gave  back 
to  the  Transvaal  the  right  to  govern  itself.  This  looked  to 
the  Boers  as  if  Great  Britain  had  been  really  beaten,  and  they 
did  not  take  much  notice  of  the  conditions  on  which  Great 
Britain  had  given  them  back  their  independence. 

It  was  only  a  few  years  later  (in  1884)  that  Germany 
seized  a  big  piece  of  Africa,  both  on  the  west  and  east  coasts. 
Gold-mines  were  now  discovered  in  the  Transvaal  and  gold- 
seekers  soon  poured  in  from  England.  Johannesburg,  the 
town  in  the  centre  of  the  district,  grew  by  leaps  and  bounds. 
The  Boers  had  always  been  clever  to  take  advantage  of  any 
chance,  so  they  put  large  taxes  on  the  newcomers  but  would 
not  allow  them  any  share  in  governing  the  country.  But  the 
'  Outlanders,'  as  the  Dutch  called  the  newcomers,  came  by 
and  by  to  feel  very  angry  against  this  unjust  t-reatment. 


AFRICA— THE  LAND  OF  MYSTERY 


523 


The  Ideal  of  Cecil  Rhodes 

There  was  at  this  time  in  South  Africa  a  young  man 
named  Cecil  Rhodes  who  saw  all  the  difficulties.  He  had 
gone  out  to  South  Africa  when  he  was  only  seventeen,  because 
of  his  delicate  health.  He  soon  got  sufficient  money  from 
gold-digging  to  be  able  to  do  what  he  liked,  and  his  one 
thought  was  that  all  the  strange  and  splendid  country  he  had 
seen  should  be  for  Great  Britain.     His  health  grew  better  and 


A    GREAT    MEETING    HELD    BY    THE    BOERS    ON    THE    VELDT    TO    CELEBRATE    THE 
REGAINING    OF    INDEPENDENCE    BY    THE    TRANSVAAL 


he  went  to  Oxford  to  complete  his  education ;  but  it  broke 
down  again  and  he  was  told  he  had  only  six  months  to  live. 
He  went  back  to  South  Africa  and  entered  the  Cape  Colony 
Parliament,  and  when  he  was  after  a  time  strong  enough  to 
go  back  to  Oxford  to  take  his  degree  he  was  already  a  states- 
man. He  was  becoming  richer  all  this  time  from  the  Kim- 
berley  diamond-fields. 

He  saw  the  danger  of  the  Transvaal  blocking  the  way  to 
the  north  and  the  equal  danger  that  the  German  colonies  on 
the  east  and  west  coasts  should  meet,  and  he  persuaded  the 
British   Government  to  take  the  huge  tract  of  land  called 


524  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

Bechuanaland  under  its  protection.  In  1889  he  founded  a 
South  African  Company  which  had  great  powers  over  the 
land  now  called  Rhodesia — after  Rhodes  himself.  Rhodesia 
stretched  up  to  the  German  colony  on  the  east  coast  and  the 
Congo  Free  State.  Bechuanaland  and  Rhodesia  kept  the  way 
to  the  north  quite  open  for  Great  Britain,  and  Englishmen 
began  to  dream  of  a  great  belt  of  land  which  should  unite 
Egypt  with  Cape  Colony  and  be  all  for  Great  Britain. 

Rhodes  became  Prime  Minister,  or  chief  man,  in  the  Govern- 
ment of  Cape  Colony  in  1890.  The  Outlanders  were  now 
thoroughly  angry  about  their  grievances,  and  one  of  them,  Dr. 
Jameson,  collected  a  band  of  men  and  tried  to  get  their  rights 
by  fighting  for  them.  The  Boers  easily  beat  them,  and  then, 
after  such  a  short  battle,  began  to  think  even  more  badly 
about  the  British.  The  Boers  all  over  South  Africa  were 
roused,  and  at  last  Sir  Alfred  JNIilner  was  sent  to  try  and  make 
peace  between  them  and  the  English  settlers.  President 
Kruger  w^as  then  head  of  the  Transvaal,  and  he  flatly  refused 
to  make  the  condition  of  the  Outlanders  any  better. 

The  Boer  War 

No  one  in  Great  Britain  was  expecting  trouble  when 
suddenly  the  Boers  demanded  things  which  could  not  be 
granted,  and  in  1899  war  broke  out  between  Great  Britain  and 
the  Transvaal.  The  Boers  were  good  fighters.  They  could 
shoot  straight  and  ride  for  days  without  being  tired  out. 
There  were  very  few  British  soldiers  in  South  Africa,  and  soon 
they  had  to  retreat  to  Ladysmith  in  Natal.  Fresh  soldiers 
were  at  once  sent  out  from  England  under  Sir  Redvers  Buller. 
Some  of  them  were  sent  to  Kimberley  in  the  diamond-fields 
and  some  to  help  the  soldiers  in  Ladysmith.  Others  tried  to 
stop  the  Boers  who  were  invading  Cape  Colony.  But  disasters 
came  everywhere.  The  British  soldiers,  brave  as  they  were, 
did  not  know  the  country,  and  were  easily  beaten  by  the  Boers. 
More  soldiers  were  sent  out  in  1900,  and  the  great  general, 


AFRICA— THE  LAND  OF  MYSTERY        525 

Lord  Roberts,  was  sent  to  lead  them,  with  Lord  Kitchener,  who 
had  avenged  Gordon  in  Egypt,  as  his  chief  assistant. 

Soldiers  came  also  from  Canada,  Australia,  and  New 
Zealand.  Things  began  to  look  brighter  for  the  British  when 
in  February  Lord  Roberts  surrounded  the  Boer  general  Cronje 
at  Koodoosberg  and  made  him  give  in.  There  were  four 
thousand  Boers  taken  prisoners  in  this  battle  on  29th  February, 
and,  the  day  before,  Ladysmith  had  been  relieved  by  Sir 
Redvers  BuUer.  The  British  army  now  in  the  Orange  Free 
State  (for  all  the  Boer  states  were  helping  the  Transvaal) 
found  no  resistance,  but  fever  had  broken  out  and  many 
soldiers  died.  The  Free  State  was  now  taken,  and  Lord 
Roberts  marched  into  the  Transvaal.  The  march  was  made 
quickly,  and  sometimes  the  Boers  won  in  small  battles,  but  in 
June  the  last  real  Boer  army  was  beaten,  and  President  Kruger 
had  fled. 

The  Transvaal  was  taken,  Kruger  sailed  to  Europe,  and  it 
was  thought  the  war  was  over.  But  for  two  years  the  struggle 
still  went  on.  The  Boers  split  up  their  army  into  small  bands 
and  attacked  whenever  and  wherever  they  could.  Lord 
Roberts  had  gone  back  to  England,  and  Lord  Kitchener 
built  small  forts  all  over  the  country.  There  were  many 
small  battles,  and  sometimes  still  the  Boers  won.  Then  at 
length,  in  March  1902,  the  Boers  saw  they  could  hold  out  no 
longer  and  went  to  Pretoria  to  ask  for  peace.  The  agreement 
was  signed  on  the  21st  of  May,  and  the  war  was  at  last  at  an 
end. 

Since  1902  the  peoples  of  South  Africa  have  been  allowed 
to  govern  themselves,  and  Cape  Colony,  Natal,  the  Transvaal, 
and  the  Orange  Free  State  have  joined  together,  just  as  the 
first  colonies  in  Canada  did.  There  are  still  some  things  on 
which  the  Boers  and  the  English  do  not  agree,  but  they  are 
learning  to  live  together  in  peace,  and  the  Union  of  South 
Africa,  which  is  the  name  of  the  four  colonies,  is  growing 
more  and  more  prosperous.  A  railway  from  Cairo  in  Egypt 
is  getting  longer  every  day  and  will  soon  meet  one  from  Cape 


526  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

Colony.     When  the  two  join  the  heart  of  the  '  Dark  Con- 
tinent '  will  be  robbed  of  some  of  its  mystery. 

The  settlements  of  other  European  nations  are  also  grow- 
ing as  well  as  the  British  colonies  north  of  South  Africa,  and 
the  natives  are  learning  to  trust  their  white  rulers  and  imitate 
their  ways. 


CHAPTER    XLVII 

THE  STORY  OF  CHINA  AND  JAPAN 

It  was  not  until  the  nineteenth  century  that  the  countries 
of  Europe  had  any  real  connection  with  the  two  great  coun- 
tries of  Asia,  China  and  Japan.  Yet  the  Chinese  had  a 
civilization  older  than  any  in  Europe.  Their  country  is  larger 
than  all  the  countries  of  Europe  put  together,  and  more  than 
four  hundred  millions  of  people  live  in  it.  The  Chinese  are  a 
Mongolian  people  like  the  Turks.  They  have  yellow  skins 
and  straight  black  hair,  which  until  lately  hung  in  long  plaits 
down  their  backs  from  the  centre  of  their  heads,  the  rest 
of  the  head  being  shaven.  The  children's  heads  are  shaven 
too,  and  until  their  hair  has  grown  long  enough  to  be  put 
into  a  '  pigtail '  it  stands  up  in  little  tufts  from  the  middle  of 
their  heads.  But  now  most  of  the  Chinese  have  had  their  pig- 
tails cut  off  to  show  their  liking  for  the  new  freedom  which 
is  finding  its  way  into  their  land. 

We  may  often  see  Chinamen  in  the  streets  of  our  big 
towns  to-day,  but  before  the  nineteenth  century  this  never 
happened.  For  the  Chinese  had  got  to  a  certain  state  of 
civilization  and  for  hundreds  of  years  they  had  gone  no 
farther.  They  wanted  to  have  nothing  to  do  with  foreigners 
and  to  live  their  own  life  in  their  own  way. 

Yet  hundreds  of  years  before  the  birth  of  Christ  the 
Chinese  knew  how  to  write.  Before  that  time,  too,  they 
could  build  suspension  bridges  and  had  made  the  wonderful 
*  Great  Wall '  — fifteen  hundred  miles  long — with  towers  and 
fortifications.  The  wall  was  really  a  road  on  top,  and  along 
it  the  caravans  travelled  which  traded  between  Siberia  and 

527 


528 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


China.  They  had  silk  manufactures  and  made  beautiful 
china,  and  they  had  discovered  the  art  of  printing  five 
hundred  years  before  it  was  discovered  in  Europe.  But 
China  had  never  gone  much  farther,  and  Europe  knew  little 
about  her  except  the  stories  which  Marco  Polo  told  after 
his  famous  journey  to  the  court  of  the  Great  Khan,  and  these 

people  had  not  believed. 

In  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury, traders  from  Portugal 
stopped  at  places  on  the 
Chinese  coast,  and  later  the 
English  followed.  In  the 
seventeenth  century  tea  was 
brought  from  China  to 
Europe.  No  one  had  ever 
seen  it  before.  But  the 
Chinese  would  not  let  people 
go  far  into  their  country. 
When,  in  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury, a  curious  Portuguese 
succeeded  in  getting  to 
Peking,  the  capital  of  China, 
he  had  his  head  cut  off. 
And  still  in  the  nineteenth 
century  it  was  the  same. 
The  Chinese  took  no  notice 
of  all  the  wonderful  things 
which  were  happening  in  Europe,  but  went  quietly  on  in 
their  own  way. 

Japan,  too,  when  people  began  to  be  interested  in  it,  in 
the  nineteenth  century,  was  just  as  anxious  to  keep  itself  free 
from  the  foreigner,  but  the  Japanese  soon  showed  that  they 
were  a  very  different  people  from  the  Chinese.  Their  history 
does  not  go  so  far  back.  They  are  probably  a  people  of 
mixed  race,  but  they  must  have  some  Chinese  blood  in  their 
veins,  and   are   rather  like  the  Chinese   to  look   at.    Some 


A    CHINESE    EMPEROR    OF    THE    NINTH 
CENTURY 

Examining  the  governors  of  cities.     (From  an 
ancient  Chinese  painting). 


O    -p 


,  I   !■  !■/>;'> 


f1f4VA\^'  d\  / 


4--  •, 


^\!^;';-#^* 


THE  STORY  OF  CHINA  AND  JAPAN       529 

people  think  that  there  is  a  large  Aryan|  element  in  their 
blood.  We  know  that  the  Japanese  had  taken  possession 
of  their  beautiful  islands  at  least  in  the  first  century  after 
the  birth  of  Christ. 

Their  history  was  not  unlike  that  of  the  peoples  of  Europe 
in  the  early  Middle  Ages.  There  was  an  emperor  called  the 
Mikado  over  all  the  land,  but  a  kind  of  feudalism  grew  up  in 
which  great  lords  got  all  power.  The  Portuguese  traders 
went  to  Japan  also  in  the  sixteenth  century  and  the  Jesuits 
sent  their  missionaries  to  teach  the  people  Christianity,  but 
not  much  progress  was  made.  Japan,  like  China,  did  not  like 
foreigners.  But  in  1853  the  United  States  sent  some  war- 
ships under  Commodore  Perry  with  a  letter  from  the  President 
to  the  Mikado  asking  him  to  make  friends  with  the  United 
States.  He  pointed  out  to  them  how  near  the  two  countries 
really  were.  The  Japanese  did  not  like  the  idea,  but  when  a 
few  months  later  the  Americans  came  for  their  answer  the 
.Japanese  said  '  Yes,'  for  they  knew  that  they  had  no  fleet  to 
fight  against  the  nations  of  Europe  and  America  if  they  chose 
to  fight  them. 

Soon  America,  Great  Britain,  Russia,  and  Holland  all 
had  permission  to  trade  at  certain  ports  with  Japan.  In 
1862  some  Japanese  were  sent  to  journey  through  Europe 
and  America.  Everything  was  new  and  wonderful  to  them. 
Their  own  land  was  very  charming,  full  of  flowers.  It 
was  from  Japan  that  chrysanthemums  were  first  brought  to 
Europe.  The  people  themselves  were  small  but  quaint  and 
pretty,  and  wore  graceful  clothes  of  cotton  or  silk  with  great 
wide  sashes.  Theirs  is  a  land  of  sunshine  though  the  top  of 
their  great  mountain  Fujiyama  is  covered  with  snow.  They 
were  fine  artists  and  everything  in  Japan  then,  as  now,  seemed 
pretty  and  clean. 

But  in  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century  the  Japanese 
knew  nothing  of  modern  inventions,  and  these  first  men  from 
Japan  who  came  to  Europe  were  full  of  enthusiasm  when 
they  went  back.     But  there  were  many  men  in  Japan  who 

2  L 


530  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

still  hated  the  idea  of  imitating  Western  ways.  These  men 
joined  together  and  overthrew  the  power  of  the  great  lords. 
The  Emperor  got  all  power  again,  and  they  hoped  he  would 
send  the  foreigners  away.  But  he  did  not.  The  old  Mikado 
died  and  the  new  one  was  full  of  enthusiasm  too  for  the  things 
which  were  to  be  learned  from  the  West. 

Soon  Japan  had  a  navy  and  an  army  imitated  from  those 
of  the  countries  of  Europe.  A  new  system  of  education 
was  set  up  and  every  child  in  Japan  was  sent  to  school. 
Tokyo,  the  capital  of  Japan,  became  the  largest  city  in  Asia 
and  one  of  the  greatest  in  the  world.  It  has  electric  light, 
telephones,  and  telegraphs,  all  learned  from  the  West.  By 
degrees,  too,  Japan  has  won  a  parliament,  through  which  the 
people  can  use  their  power,  though  the  Mikado  is  still  more 
powerful  and  important  in  some  ways  than  most  *  constitu- 
tional '  kings.  The  Japanese  people  have  great  respect  and 
reverence  for  those  above  them  and  for  old  people  generally. 
They  are  very  honourable  too  and  very  brave.  In  some  ways 
they  are  the  most  wonderful  people  of  our  modern  world  for 
the  quick  eager  way  they  have  learned  so  many  new  things  in 
so  short  a  time.  Japan,  a  small  nation,  after  all  about  as  big 
as  Great  Britain,  first  proved  her  new-found  strength  in  a 
struggle  with  China. 

All  this  time  China  remained  as  obstinate  as  ever,  hating  all 
new  things.  In  1840  she  had  been  obliged  to  open  up  some 
of  her  ports  to  British  trade  and  had  given  up  the  city  of 
Hong  Kong  to  Great  Britain,  but  this  was  only  after  a 
war  between  the  English  and  Chinese  called  the  *  Opium 
War.'  British  traders  carried  opium,  which  they  got  from  the 
poppy-fields  of  North  India,  into  China.  Now  opium  is 
a  drug  which  makes  people  sleepy  and  stupid  when  they 
eat  it  and  ruins  the  health  of  people  who  get  into  the 
habit  of  using  it.  It  makes  people  intoxicated  in  a  worse 
way  even  than  too  much  wine  or  beer.  Some  of  the 
Chinese  people  grew  very  fond  of  opium  and  the  Emperor 
tried   to   prevent  the  British   from  bringing  it  into   China. 


THE  STORY  OF  CHINA  AND  JAPAN       531 

A    short    war    took    place    and    then   the   Chinese  had   to 
give  in. 

A  few  years  later  there  was  another  war,  in  which  France 
and  England  together  destroyed  some  of  the  Chinese  forts 
and  marched  to  Peking.  The  Chinese  Emperor  had  put 
some  English  in  prison.  These  were  released,  but  to  give 
the  Chinese  a  lesson  the  wonderful  summer  palace  of  the 
Emperor  at  Peking  was  destroyed  by  the  soldiers.  More 
ports  were  then  opened.  Soon  afterwards  the  English 
helped  the  Chinese  soldiers  to  put  down  a  rebellion  of 
thousands  of  Chinese  who  had  risen  against  the  govern- 
ment, following  their  leader,  who  was  a  madman  who 
thought  he  was  a  prophet  and  ought  to  rule  over  China. 
This  time  English  and  Chinese  soldiers  marched  together 
against  the  rebels,  and  peace  was  made.  At  last  the  United 
States  and  the  great  European  countries  were  allowed  to  send 
ambassadors  to  live  in  Peking,  as  they  do  to  all  the  capitals 
of  other  countries. 

The  Chino- Japanese  war  broke  out  in  1894.  It  was  about 
the  peninsula  of  Korea,  which  lies  between  the  two  countries. 
It  did  not  belong  to  either,  but  the  Japanese  heard  that  the 
Chinese  were  making  ready  to  invade  it.  The  Japanese  sent 
word  to  China  that  this  must  not  be,  but  the  Chinese  went 
on  with  their  preparations.  Then  war  came.  Everybody 
thought  that  little  Japan  would  be  crushed  by  the  great 
power  of  China,  but  the  Japanese  won  on  land  and  sea.  The 
Japanese  fleet  won  a  great  victory  over  the  Chinese  in  Korea 
Bay,  and  then  the  Chinese  ships  sailed  off  to  Port  Arthur  in 
Manchuria.  But  the  Japanese  landed  and  took  the  town 
which  is  now  one  terminus  of  the  Trans-Siberian  railway. 
Then  China  begged  for  peace.  The  Japanese  were  admired  by 
all  Europe.  Her  young  soldiers  had  fought  like  heroes.  A 
story  is  told  of  one  boy  who  was  blowing  the  bugle  as  he  stood 
by  his  captain.  A  bullet  struck  him  in  the  chest,  but  still  he 
blew  till  he  dropped  dead. 

But  the  Japanese  had  never  really  feared  China.     They 


532  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

knew  that  Russia  wanted  to  take  China  for  herself,  and 
indeed  no  sooner  was  the  treaty  of  peace  signed  between 
China  and  Japan,  than  Russia  got  France  and  Germany  to 
join  her  in  taking  all  that  Japan  had  won.  The  Japanese 
waited  their  time.  Meanwhile,  in  the  year  1900,  many 
Chinese,  angry  at  the  way  in  which  the  European  countries 
had  interfered  in  China,  rose  to  attack  the  houses  in  Peking 
where  the  European  ambassadors  lived.  The  German 
ambassador  was  murdered  in  the  street.  Many  missionaries 
who  were  trying  to  convert  China  to  Christianity  were 
murdered  in  the  same  way,  or  burnt  in  their  houses  with 
their  wives  and  children.  Many  of  the  ambassadors  were 
besieged  in  Peking,  but  were  saved  when  the  armies  of  six 
countries,  with  Japan  amongst  them,  marched  to  their  help. 

So  far  the  relations  between  China  and  Europe  have  not 
been  a  success,  yet  the  Chinese  are  a  splendid  people  in  many 
ways,  full  of  energy  and  industry.  When  they  become  Chris- 
tians they  are  splendid  men  indeed.  And  just  lately  men  in 
China  have  risen  to  demand  freedom  too,  like  the  peoples  of 
the  West.  A  new  constitution  has  been  planned.  We  do  not 
yet  know  how  it  will  work,  but  the  Chinese  sent  a  touching 
request  for  prayers  to  be  said  in  England  for  their  success 
in  their  new  way  of  life.  On  Sunday,  27th  April  1913, 
prayers  were  said  in  most  of  the  churches  throughout  Great 
Britain  for,  in  the  words  of  the  Chinese  message,  '  the  newly 
established  government,  for  the  President  yet  to  be  elected,  for 
the  constitution  of  the  Republic,  that  the  Government  may 
be  recognised  by  the  Powers,  that  peace  may  reign  within  our 
country,  that  strong,  virtuous  men  may  be  elected  to  office, 
that  the  Government  may  be  established  on  a  strong 
foundation.' 

With  Japan,  as  we  have  seen,  things  are  quite  different. 
In  the  year  1904  the  Japanese  felt  themselves  strong  enough 
to  demand  their  rights  from  Russia,  and  the  Russo-Japanese 
war  began.  Before  this  every  one  had  feared  Russia.  People 
had  believed  that  she  had  a  wonderful  army,  but  neither  her 


THE  STORY  OF  CHINA  AND  JAPAN        533 

army  nor  her  navy  was  a  match  for  those  of  Japan.  At  the 
beginning  of  the  war,  the  Japanese  defeated  the  Russian  fleet, 
and  landed  their  armies  in  Korea.  Terrible  battles  followed, 
in  any  one  of  which  the  Russians  lost  more  soldiers  than  were 
killed  altogether  in  the  Boer  War.  When  peace  was  made 
Korea  was  given  to  Japan.  Before  this  Japan  and  England 
had  made  a  treaty  of  friendship.  Both  were  determined  to 
prevent  the  power  of  Russia  from  growing.  England  feared 
that  Russia  might  attack  her  empire  in  India,  and  both  were 
determined  that  China  should  be  left  with  the  Chinese.  For 
this  and  other  reasons  the  friendship  between  England  and 
Japan  is  very  close.  Both  are  island  nations  and  have  very 
much  in  common. 


CHAPTER   XLVIII 

OUR  WORLD  TO-DAY 

Our  world  to-day  is  very  different  from  the  world  of  even 
a  hundred  years  ago.  Children  who  have  not  had  time  to 
see  many  changes  can  hardly  understand  how  different  it  is. 
A  hundred  years  ago  steam-engines  were  only  just  being 
thought  of.  Before  that  things  had  had  to  be  carried  along 
rough  roads  in  wagons  from  place  to  place.  People  who 
were  rich  enough  travelled  on  horseback  or  in  carriages,  and 
for  ordinary  travellers  in  the  eighteenth  century  there  were 
stage-coaches  which  travelled  between  the  biggest  towns  very 
slowly  and  painfully,  for  all  over  England  and  in  other 
countries  too  the  roads  were  very  bad.  Now,  when  we  want 
to  go  to  another  town  we  step  into  a  railway  train  which 
carries  us  there  at  the  rate  of  from  thirty  to  sixty  miles  an 
hour. 

Even  when  the  roads  had  begun  to  be  made  better, 
and  the  *  ruts  four  foot  deep '  got  rid  of  towards  the  end  of 
the  eighteenth  century,  it  took  three  whole  days  for  a  letter 
to  be  carried  from  Bath  to  London.  Now  we  can  post  a 
letter  in  any  town  in  England  or  Scotland  and  know  that  it 
will  reach  London  by  the  next  morning.  In  those  days 
families  did  not  break  up  and  scatter  all  over  the  world.  When 
they  did,  it  was  very  difficult  for  them  to  get  news  of  each 
other.  Even  after  Queen  Victoria  began  to  reign  in  England 
people  had  generally  to  pay  at  least  a  shilling  for  a  letter  to 
be  sent  to  another  part  of  England ;  but  then  it  was  arranged 
that  letters  could  be  sent  to  any  part  of  the  British  Isles  for 
a  penny,  and  now  a  penny  stamp  will  carry  a  letter  to  our 


OUR  WORLD  TO-DAY  535 

friends  in  any  of  the  British  colonies,  so  that,  though  people  are 
separated  by  such  enormous  distances,  they  feel  in  some  ways 
nearer  to  each  other  than  people  in  different  parts  of  England 
did  a  hundred  years  ago. 

The  first  real  passenger  train  began  to  run  in  England  in 
1830.  It  went  at  the  rate  of  twenty  miles  an  hour,  which 
seemed  very  terrible  and  dangerous  to  people  then,  and, 
sad  to  say,  one  man  was  killed  on  the  opening  day  of 
this  railway,  between  Liverpool  and  Manchester.  Now  our 
express  trains  go  at  the  rate  of  sixty  miles  an  hour.  By 
this  time  it  was  found  that  steam  could  be  used  to  drive 
ships  instead  of  waiting  for  wind  to  fill  their  sails.  It  was 
thought  very  wonderful  when  a  steamer  called  the  Great 
Western  crossed  the  Atlantic  from  Bristol  to  New  York  in 
fifteen  days.     Now  it  is  regularly  done  in  a  week. 

More  wonderful  than  the  discovery  of  steam  was  that  of 
electricity.  Through  it  people  can  send  messages  by  tele- 
gram so  that  news  can  be  had  in  a  few  minutes  from  places 
miles  away,  and  through  its  use  on  the  telephone  people  can 
speak  to  each  other  from  place  to  place,  even  from  cities  so 
far  apart  as  Paris  and  London.  Cables,  enclosing  telegraph 
wires,  have  been  laid  down  on  the  ocean  floor  from  England 
to  America,  and  '  cablegrams '  can  be  sent  so  that  in  a  few 
hours  people  in  any  part  of  America  can  have  news  from 
friends  in  Europe.  Submarine  cables  are  now  laid  between 
many  places  all  over  the  world.  But  in  the  last  few  years  an 
inventor  called  Marconi  has  discovered  that  messages  can  be 
sent  by  electricity  between  two  instruments  without  any  wires 
at  all.  This  would  have  seemed  like  magic  to  people  a 
hundred  years  ago. 

It  is  a  very  wonderful  and  important  discovery.  Already 
it  has  been  very  useful.  Ships  in  distress  which  have  wireless 
instruments  can  ask  for  help  from  other  ships  miles  away. 
It  was  through  the  wireless  messages  by  Phillips,  the  heroic 
telegraphist  on  the  great  steamer  the  Titanic,  which  was 
wrecked  in  1912,  that  help  came  from  the  Carpathia,  and  the 


536  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

people  who  had  been  got  into  the  boats  before  the  steamer 
sank  were  saved.  Almost  like  magic,  too,  it  seems  that 
photographs  can  also  be  sent  by  electricity,  so  that 
photographs  of  a  football  match  or  any  interesting  event  can 
be  sent  from  the  place  it  has  happened  in,  such  as  Leeds  or 
Manchester,  and  the  pictures  will  be  published  in  the  London 
evening  newspapers  an  hour  or  two  later. 

The  daily  newspaper,  again,  is  a  thing  that  was  quite  new 
to  our  great-grandfathers.  There  were  daily  papers  in  London 
at  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century,  but  they  were  few  and 
expensive.  After  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century  they 
became  common  in  other  large  towns,  and  now  very  few 
people  feel  quite  happy  without  their  morning  and  evening 
paper,  in  which  they  may  read  the  things  that  have  happened 
all  over  the  world  the  day  before,  things  the  news  of  which 
would  have  taken  weeks  and  months,  and  even  years,  to  come 
to  us  before  the  days  of  telegrams.  Electricity  is  used  of 
course,  too,  for  light  and  heat,  and  new  houses  nearly  every- 
where have  electric  light,  while  even  gas-light  was  not  known 
a  hundred  years  ago  when  people  used  candles  or  oil  lamps. 

In  the  last  few  years,  too,  it  has  been  discovered  that  man 
can  travel  through  the  air  quicker  and  more  smoothly  than  by 
the  quickest  express  trains.  The  great  invention  of  the  air- 
ship has  come  to  us  within  the  last  few  years.  Every  few 
weeks  some  improvement  is  made,  and  airmen  are  learning 
to  manage  their  ships  more  easily.  But  as  yet  things  are 
only  at  the  beginning,  and  already  many  brave  airmen  have 
lost  their  lives,  as  brave  pioneers  must  often  do.  People  talk 
of  the  days  when  nations  will  no  longer  fight  at  sea  with  the 
great  iron-clad  warships,  which  also  were  first  built  in  the 
nineteenth  century,  but  will  fight  their  battles  in  the  air  with 
fleets  of  airships.  Balloons  were  invented  at  the  end  of  the 
eighteenth  century.  In  them  also  men  can  go  through  the 
air,  but  at  first  they  could  only  go  like  sailing-ships  in  the 
direction  in  which  they  were  sent  by  the  wind.  Now,  how- 
ever, in  the  last  few  years  airmen  have  discovered  how  to 


1+ 


538  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

make  balloons  go  in  any  direction  they  wish,  and  the  'dirigible' 
balloons  are  thought  to  be  more  useful  by  many  people  than 
even  airships.  Several  airmen  have  now  crossed  the  English 
Channel,  and  prizes  are  being  offered  for  the  first  flight  right 
round  England  and  Scotland,  and  the  first  flight  across  the 
Atlantic. 

So  we  live  in  a  world  of  change  and  adventure.  Brave 
and  clever  people  are  doing  wonderful  things  every  day  to 
try  to  make  the  world  a  more  comfortable  place.  But  even 
more  wonderful  than  these  changes  in  the  things  around  us — 
changes  most  of  which  have  begun  in  England  and  have 
spread  all  over  the  world — are  the  changes  w^hich  have  come 
over  the  minds  of  men.  In  most  countries  now  men  may 
believe  as  they  like,  and  religion  is  a  matter  for  each  person 
to  settle  for  himself.  This  spirit  of  toleration  and  freedom 
is  the  thing  which  we  ought  to  value  most  of  all  the  things 
which  make  our  world  to-day  different  from  the  world  of  a 
hundred  years  ago.  At  the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth 
century  the  laws  against  Catholics,  which  prevented  them 
from  taking  part  in  the  government  of  their  countries,  were 
withdrawn  in  England  and  Ireland.  For  hundreds  of  years 
the  Cathohcs  in  England  and  Ireland  had  been  looked  upon 
almost  as  criminals,  and  very  hard  laws  had  been  passed 
against  them.  This  was  especially  terrible  in  Ireland,  where 
nearly  all  the  people  were  Catholic.  Up  to  this  time  the 
Irish  had  had  their  own  parliament,  but  only  Protestants 
could  sit  in  it  or  even  vote  for  the  people  who  became 
members  of  parliament.  But  now  this  was  changed,  and  at 
last  the  Catholic  Irish  were  given  the  ordinary  rights  of 
citizens.  The  Irish  parliament  was,  however,  given  up,  and 
Ireland  for  the  future  sent  members  to  the  English  parlia- 
ment, as  Scotland  had  already  done  for  a  hundred  years. 
Many  of  the  Irish  have  never  been  pleased  with  this  arrange- 
ment, and  Ireland  may  soon  have  '  Home  Rule '  again.  But 
Catholic  emancipation  was  only  one  sign  of  a  new  spirit 
which  was  passing  over  the  world. 


OUR  WORLD  TO-DAY  539 

The  new  democratic  spirit  is  seen  too  in  the  education  of  chil- 
dren. In  nearly  all  countries  now  children  are  sent  to  schools 
which  the  governments  keep  up,  so  that  even  the  poorest 
people  can  give  their  children  a  good  education.  A  hundred 
years  ago  very  many  of  the  people  could  not  read  or  write 
at  all,  and  especially  miserable  were  the  children  of  poor 
people  in  England  at  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century  and 
the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth.  In  the  second  half  of  the 
eighteenth  century  manufactures  had  grown  very  quickly  in 
England.  Things  which  had  before  been  made  by  people  in 
their  homes  in  the  country  were  now  made  much  more 
quickly  in  great  factories  built  in  the  towns.  This  was 
through  the  invention  of  new  machines. 

It  was  now  found  that  even  children  could  help  to  work 
these  machines,  and  little  children  of  six  and  seven  years 
old  were  crowded  into  the  factories,  working  from  early 
morning  till  dark.  But  soon  this  was  changed.  Laws  were 
passed  which  said  that  children  should  no  longer  work  in  the 
factories  until  they  were  older,  and  then  only  for  a  few  hours. 
Now  no  boy  or  girl  is  allowed  to  leave  school  until  fourteen 
years  of  age,  and  so  every  child  has  a  chance  of  learning 
things  which  will  help  it  to  live  a  wise  and  happy  life. 

The  children  of  the  British  Empire,  whether  in  Great 
Britain  or  the  colonies,  have  also  the  joy  of  feeling  that 
they  belong  to  a  great  race,  that  all  over  the  world  people 
speaking  their  language  and  loving  their  country  are  living 
their  lives  in  their  own  way.  They  can  like  and  admire  the 
people  of  other  nations,  but  they  cannot  help  loving  the 
people  of  their  own  empire.  It  is  this  feeling  of  loyalty  to 
the  nation  and  the  empire  that  led  to  the  setting  up  of  *  boy 
scouts '  in  England,  a  great  movement  which  has  now  spread 
to  other  countries.  For  while  we  wish  that  peace  may  be 
kept  between  the  nations,  we  naturally  feel  determined  to  be 
ready  to  defend  our  empire  if  that  peace  is  broken. 

In  reading  history  children  nearly  always  feel  glad  that  they 
were  born  in  their  own  time  and  not  in  the  past,  when  there 


540  THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 

was  so  much  cruelty  and  bloodshed.  For,  unfortunately,  in 
many  parts  of  the  story  of  the  world  it  is  tales  of  cruelty  and 
intolerance  which  have  to  be  told.  But  then,  too,  there  are  the 
tales  of  the  heroes,  and  saints,  and  martyrs,  the  pioneers  and 
discoverers,  and  all  who  have  done  their  part  to  make  our 
world  to-day  a  better  place.  This  is  one  of  the  great  lessons 
of  history,  that  we  too  should  do  our  part  honourably  and  well, 
and  in  reading  the  story  of  the  world,  think  not  only  of  the 
romance  of  the  past  and  present,  but  of  the  romance  of  the 
future  too. 


INDEX 


Aaron,  22. 

Abelard  and  Heloise,  233-236. 

Abraham,  13. 

Abyssinia,  509. 

Adrian  iv. ,  Pope,  233. 

.^milius  Paulus,  125,  126. 

^schyluB,  51. 

^tius,  176,  177. 

Africa,  story  of,  509-526. 

Agesilaus,  70. 

Agincourt,  battle  of,  284. 

Agnes,  Saint,  165. 

Agrigentum,  56. 

Aidan,  Saint,  186. 

Airships,  536. 

Akbar,  410. 

Alaric    the    Visigoth,    sack    of 

Rome  by,  173. 
Alba  Longa,  88,  91. 
Albigenses,  the,  233,  262. 
Albuquerque,  308. 
Alcibiades,  63-68. 
Aldine  Press,  299. 
Alexander  the  Great,   75,   76- 

83. 
Alexandria,  city  of,  81,  83. 
Alfred    the  Great,    wars   with 

the  Northmen,  201. 
Algeria,  510,  511. 
Alhambra,  the,  192. 
Alsace  and  Lorraine,  surrender 

to  Prussia,  501. 
Alva,  Duke  of,  Spanish  regent 

in  Netherlands,  345,  347,  348. 
Ambrose,  Saint,  170,  172. 
America,   colonisation  of,  371, 

375,   379;  discovery  of,  313, 

352,  422;   Spanish  conquests 

in,  353,  354.    See  also  Canada, 

United     States,    and    South 

America. 
American  Civil  War,  443. 
American    Independence,   War 

of,  432,  435-445. 
Angelico,  Fra,  296,  297,  298. 
Anjou,   Charles    of,   250,    251, 

254. 
Anne,"  Queen,  390,  403. 
Anselm,  Saint,  237,  238. 
Antiochus,  King  of  Syria,  124, 

125. 
Antonius,  Marcus,  151,  152. 
Appian  Way,  108. 
Arabs,  the,  188. 


Arhela,  battle  of,  81. 

Arcadius,  Emperor,  173. 

Arcot,  siege  of,  415. 

Argentine  Republic,  506. 

Arian  heresy,  168. 

Arinns,  the,  169,  174. 

Aristagoras,  34. 

Aristides,  37,  38. 

Aristophanes,  52. 

Armada,  the  Spanish,  358. 

Arnold  of  Brescia,  236. 

Artaxerxes,  69. 

Arj'an  race,  27 ;  caste  system 
of,  409,  410;  in  India,  27, 
409. 

Asia  Minor,  Greek  colonies  in, 
31,  32. 

Assyria,  12. 

Assyrians,  the,  25. 

Athanasius,  169. 

Athene,  statue  in  the  Par- 
thenon, 49,  51. 

Athens,  30 ;  growth  in  riches 
and  power,  48 ;  Long  Walls 
of,  54,  62  ;  Peloponnesian 
wars  with  Sparta,  54,  60  ; 
Persian  Wars,  32,  34,  35,  42, 
45 ;  surrender  to  the  Spartans, 
67  ;  war  against  Philip  of 
Macedon,  74. 

Attica,  Spartan  invasion  of, 
62. 

Attila  the  Hun,  invasion  of 
Italy  by,  175-177. 

Augustine  of  Hippo,  Saint,  172, 
174. 

Augustine,  Saint,  first  Arch- 
bishop of  Canterbury,  185, 
186. 

Augustus,  Emperor,  151,  154. 

Aurangzib,  the  Great  Mogul, 
412. 

Austerlitz,  battle  of,  479. 

Australasia,  446-455. 

Australia,  story  of,  446-453. 

Austria,  war  with  Hungary, 
496. 

Austrian  Succession,  war  of, 
400. 

Babylon,  12;  captivity  of  the 

Jews  in,  25. 
Bacon,  Roger,  264. 
Balaclava,  battle  of,  497. 


'Balance  of  Power,'  360,   381, 

387. 
Baldwin,   King   of  Jerusalem, 

321. 
Balkan  Peninsula,  conquest  by 

the  Turks,  294,  295. 
Ball,  John,  275. 
Baltimore,  Lord,  277. 
Barbarians,  Invasion  of  Roman 

Empire  by,  165-178  ;  Marius' 

victories  over,  137. 
Barbarossa,  Frederick,  224. 
Barbary  pirates,  510. 
Basil,  Saint,  169,  170. 
Bastille,  taking  of,  459. 
Bechuanaland,  524. 
Becket,    Saint    Thomas,     237, 

240,  241. 
Bede,  187. 
Belgium,     Kingdom     of,     349, 

494. 
Belisarius,  182. 
Benedict,  Saint,  184. 
Benjamin,  story  of,  19-21. 
Bernard  of  Clairvaux,  Saint,  222, 

231,  232,  233,  235,  236,  237. 
Bible,  printing  of,  298;   trans- 
lating of,  327. 
Bilbao,  253,  254. 
Bilney,  Thomas,  330. 
Bismarck,  Otto  von,  299. 
Black  Death,  268,  274. 
Black  Friars,  263. 
'  Black  Hole  of  Calcutta, '  416. 
Black  Prince,  272,  273. 
Blake,  Admiral,  378. 
Blanche  of  Castile,  252. 
Blenheim,  battle  of,  390. 
Bliicher,  General,  488. 
Blue  Nile,  source  discovered  by 

Bruce,  512. 
Boer  War,  the,  521,  522,  524. 
Boethius,  180,  181. 
Bolivar,  506. 
Bonaventura,  Saint,  264. 
Boniface  viii..  Pope,  268,  269. 
Boniface,  Saint,  187. 
'Boston  tea-partj','  the,  436. 
Botany  Bay,  448. 
Botticelli,  Sandro,  297. 
Braddock,  General,  428,  429. 
Brahmans,  409. 
Brandenburg,  the  Great  Elector 

of,  401. 

541 


542 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WOULD 


Brazil,  Republic  of,  506. 
Brigit  of  Sweden,  Saint,  279. 
Brill,  siege  of,  347. 
Britain,  Christianity  introduced 

into,    186 ;    landing    of    the 

Romans,  155 ;  Romans  leave, 

175. 
Brown,  John,  443. 
Bruce,    James,    the    explorer, 

512. 
Bruce,  Robert,  256. 
Brunellesco,  295,  296. 
Bruno,  Saint,  229. 
Buade,  Louis  de,  426. 
Bucephalus,  82. 
Bunker's  Hill,  battle  of,  438. 
Bunyan,  John,  369,  370. 
Burgoyne,  General,  440. 
Burgundians,  the,  176. 
Byron,  Lord,  494,  495. 

Cable,  the  submarine,  535. 
Cabot,  John,  352,  422. 
Cadamosto,  305,  306. 
Caedmon,  187. 
Calais,  the  burghers  of,  273. 
Calvin,  John,  334. 
Cambridge,  University  of,  263. 
Camillus,  97,  101,  102. 
Campanians,  the,  105. 
Canaan,  Land  of,  13,  22. 
Canada,  story  of,  422-434. 
Cannaj,  battle  of,  119. 
Canute,  King,  202. 
Cape    Colony,     war     between 

English  and  Dutch  in,  521. 
Cape  of  Good  Hope,  discovery 

of,  308. 
Capet,  Hugh,  King  of  France, 

205. 
Carthage,  siege  and  destruction 

by  Romans,  127;  wars  with 

Greece,   57,   113  - 115  ;    wars 

with   Rome,    115-122,    127- 

128. 
Carthusian  monks,  230, 
Cartier,  Jacques,  424. 
Casabianca,  471. 
Catacombs  of  Rome,  162. 
Catherine  ii..  Czarina,  407. 
Catherine  of  Siena,  Saint,  280. 
Catholics    and    Protestants    in 

England,  330,  331 ;  in  France, 

335  -  337  ;     in    Netherlands, 

342. 
Cave-dwellers,  the,  3. 
Cavour,  503. 
Caxton,  William,  299. 
Cecilia,  Saint,  163. 
Celts,  the,  98  ;  burning  of  Rome 

by,    100 ;    Clusium    besieged 

by,   99 ;  driven  from  Rome, 

102 ;  in  Ireland,  186. 
Cervantes,  361. 
Chseronea,  battle  of,  74. 
Champlain,  Samuel,  424. 
Charge  of  the  Light  Brigade, 

497. 


Charles  i.  of  England,  366-368. 
Charles  ii.    of  England,    369; 

secret  treaties  with  Louis  xiv., 

385,  387. 
Charles  ii.  of  Spain,  386,  389. 
Charles  v..  Emperor,  324,  342, 

346. 
Charles  vii.  of  France,  and  Joan 

of  Arc,  286,  288,  290,  291. 
Charles  x.  of  France,  493. 
Charles  xii.  of  Sweden,  396. 
Charles  Martel,  191,  192,  193. 
Charles    of     Anjou,    King    of 

Sicily,  250,  251,  254. 
Charles  the  Bold,  Duke  of  Bur- 
gundy, 291. 
Charles  the  Great,  195-199. 
Chartreuse,  the  Grand,  230. 
Chaucer,  Geoffrey,  277,  278. 
Children's  crusade,  246. 
Chili,  revolution  in,  506. 
China,  story  of,  527-531. 
Christianity,    the    coming    of, 

157  ;   spread  in  the  Middle 

Ages,  184. 
Christina  of  Sweden,  364. 
Cid,  the,  227,  228. 
Cinna,  138,  139. 
Cistercian  monks,  the,  231,  232. 
Clare,  Saint,  264. 
Clearchus,  69. 
Clement  vii.,  Pope,  325. 
Cleon,  63. 

Cleopatra,  148,  152,  154. 
Clients,  the,  90. 
Clitus,  78,  83. 
Clive,  Robert,  413-418. 
Clovis,    King    of    the  Franks, 

183. 
Cluniac  Reform,  208,  215. 
Cluny,  monks  of,  207. 
Clusium,  siege  of,  99. 
Colet,  John,  317,  339. 
Coligny,  Admiral,  336. 
Columba,  Saint,  196. 
Columbus,     Christopher,     302, 

309,  310-314. 
Confederacy  of  Delos,   48,  54, 

60,  64,  67,  68. 
Conrad,  Emperor,  crusade  of, 

222. 
Conradin,  250,  251. 
Constance,  Council  of,  281,  282. 
Constantine  the  Great,  165. 
Constantinople,  capture  by  the 

Turks,  293,  294,  295 ;  Eastern 

Roman  Empire  at,  166 ;  taken 

by  Venetians,  245. 
Consuls,  Roman,  94. 
Cook,  Captain,  448,  449. 
Copenhagen,  battle  of,  476, 
Copernicus,  300. 
Corday,  Charlotte,  466. 
Corinth,  61 ;  burning  of,  126. 
Cornwallis,  Lord,  440. 
Cortes,  Fernando,  conquest  of 

Mexico  by,  354,  355. 
Corunna,  battle  of,  483. 


Corvinus,  Matthias,  294. 
Counter-Reformation,  the,  339- 

349. 
Cranmer,  Archbishop,  329,  330, 

331. 
Crassus,  143,  144,  147. 
Crecy,  battle  of,  271. 
Crimean  War,  496,  497. 
Croesus,  32,  33,  34. 
Cromagnard  men,  4. 
Cromer,  Lord,  515,  518. 
Cromwell,  Oliver,  367,  368,  369, 

377. 
Croton,  55. 
Crusades,  the,  217-228,  245-247, 

252-255. 
Curiae,  the,  90,  91. 
Cynoscephalffi,  battle  of,  124. 
Cyrus,  expedition  against  Arta- 

xerxes,  69. 

Dampier,  William,  448. 

Dandalo,  Doge,  246. 

Danelaw,  the,  201. 

Danes,  the,  196 ;  in  England, 
201. 

Dante,  265-267. 

Danton,  459,  466. 

Darius  I.,  King  of  Persia,  35,  36. 

Darius  iii..  King  of  Persia, 
defeated  by  Alexander  the 
Great,  79 ;  death  of,  82. 

Dark  Ages,  179-205. 

Darwin,  Charles,  449. 

David,  King,  23. 

Demosthenes,  Athenian  gen- 
eral, 66. 

Demosthenes,  Greek  orator,  74, 
76,  84. 

Denmark,  surrender  of  Schles- 
wig-Holstein  to  Germany, 
300. 

De  Witt,  the  brothers,  387. 

Diaz,  Bartholomew,  306,  313, 
518. 

Diocletian,  Emperor,  persecu- 
tion of  the  Christians,  165. 

Dissenters,  the,  400. 

Dominic,  Saint,  262-265. 

Donatello,  296. 

Drake,  Sir  Francis,  352,  356, 
357,  358. 

Dravidians,  409. 

Dresden,  battle  of,  487. 

Dupleix,  General,  413-415. 

Dutch,  fight  for  freedom  from 
Spain,  342-349;  in  Cape 
Colony,  521 ;  war  with  Eng- 
land, 378.    See  also  Holland. 

Eastern  Church,  the,  193,  206. 

Edesaa,  siege  of,  222. 

Edict  of  Nantes,  revocation  by 
Louis  XIV.,  383,  384. 

Education,  progress  of,  539. 

Edward  the  Confessor,  203,  208. 

Edward  i.,  on  crusade  in  Pales- 
tine, 254,  255. 


INDEX 


543 


Edward  in.,  wars  against 
France,  270. 

Edward  iv.,  290. 

Edward  VI.,  331. 

Egmont,  Count,  344,  345,  346. 

Egypt  and  the  Egyptians,  10 ; 
Alexander  the  Great's  con- 
quest of,  81 ;  British  rule  in, 
515;  history  of,  511-518; 
made  a  Roman  province  by 
Octavius,  154 ;  Napoleon's 
campaign  in,  470,  471. 

Electricity,  535,  536. 

Elizabeth,  Czarina  of  Russia, 
405. 

Elizabeth,  Queen,  and  Mary 
Queen  of  Scots,  332;  con- 
dition of  people  during  her 
reign,  374  ;  great  men  of  her 
reign,  351-352 ;  monopolies 
granted  by,  365;  wars  with 
Spain,  360. 

Emperors,  Holy  Roman,  elec- 
tion of,  212,  251 ;  struggle 
with  Popes,  212,  265. 

Enghien,  Duke  d',  478. 

England,  after  the  Norman 
Conquest,  237 ;  American 
colonies  lost  by,  435-445 ; 
colonial  wars  with  France, 
399,  405,  412,  413,  426; 
Crimean  war  against  Russia, 
497 ;  feudal  system  in,  204 ; 
great  civil  war  in,  366 ;  in  the 
eighteenth  century,  399,  400  ; 
Napoleonic  wars,  470,  476 ; 
Reformation  in,  316;  Re- 
volution, 385 ;  wars  against 
Louis  XIV.,  388-390 ;  war  with 
Spain,  358, 

Epaminondas,  71,  72. 

Ephesus,  32,  158. 

Erasmus,  317,  339,  374. 

Ericson,  Lief,  422. 

Esau  and  Jacob,  17. 

Ethelred  the  Unready,  202. 

Etruscans,  the,  87,  92,  96; 
Roman  conquest  of,  103, 104  ; 
war  with  the  Celts,  99. 

Eugene  of  Savoy,  Prince,  390, 
394. 

Eugenie,  Empress,  501. 

Euripides,  51. 

Europe,  remaking  after  Na- 
poleon's wars,  491. 

Exarch  of  Ravenna,  182. 

Ferdinand  of  Bohemia,  Em- 
peror, 362,  363. 

Feudal  system,  203. 

'Field  of  Lies,' 198. 

'Field  of  the  Cloth  of  Gold,' 
325. 

Fisher,  Bishop,  829,  330. 

Flinders,  Captain,  449, 

Florence,  city  states  of,  252, 265 ; 
Medici  family  of,  292 ;  Re- 
naissance in,  295. 


Forest,  John,  330. 

Fox,  Charles  James,  480. 

France,  colonial  wars  with 
English,  399,  405,  413,  426; 
growth  of  power  of  kings,  290, 
291 ;  kingdom  under  Hugh 
Capet,  199,  205;  Napoleon's 
wars,  470,  472;  part  in  Cri- 
mean war,  497;  Peasants' 
Revolt  in,  276 ;  persecu- 
tion of  Protestants  in,  335 ; 
possessions  in  Africa,  510, 
511 ;  raids  of  Northmen  upon, 
200  ;  Republic,  501 ;  Revolu- 
tion in,  456-467 ;  Revolutions 
of  1830  and  1848,  434;  war 
with  Prussia,  500. 

Francis  i.  of  France,  324,  325, 

Francis,  Emperor,  365. 

Francis  of  Aasisi,  Saint,  258- 
262. 

Francis  Xavier,  Saint,  341. 

Franciscans,  the,  260,  264. 

Franco-Prussian  War,  500. 

Franks,  the,  167,  174,  192,  193  ; 
conquest  of  Gaul  by,  183 ; 
Saracens  defeated  at  Tours 
by,  191. 

Frederick  ii.,  crusade  of,  247 ; 
wars  with  the  Popes,  247, 
248-250. 

Frederick  Barbarossa,  crusade 
of,  222 ;  quarrels  with  the 
Popes,  223. 

Frederick,  Elector  Palatinate, 
362. 

Frederick  the  Great  of  Prussia, 
402-405,  406,  407. 

Frederick  the  Wise,  Elector  of 
Saxony,  318,  320. 

French  Revolution,  the,  456- 
467. 

Gama,  Vasco  da,  307. 

Garibaldi,  503,  504. 

Geddes,  Jenny,  367. 

Genseric,  king  of  Vandals,  sack 
of  Rome  by,  177. 

George  ii.  of  England,  403,  404. 

George  in.  of  England,  440. 

Germany,  confederation  of 
states  in,  491 ;  counter  re- 
formation in,  362 ;  Franco- 
Prussian  War,  500,  501; 
kingdom  established,  199, 
206 ;  Reformation  in,  318 ; 
union  under  William  i.,  499, 
502. 

Ghibellines  and  Guelfs,  265. 

Ghiberti,  296. 

Ghuzni,  conquest  of  India  by, 
410. 

Gilbert,  Sir  Humphrey,  371. 

Giotto,  261,  293. 

Gladiators'  Revolt,  143. 

Godfrey  de  Bouillon,  220. 

Gordian  knot,  the,  79. 

Gordon,  General,  515-518. 


Goths,  the,  167 ;  invasion  of 
Italy  by,  173. 

Gracchus,  Gaius,  131-135. 

Gracchus,  Tiberius,  131-133. 

Granada,  fall  of,  311. 

Great  Charter,  the,  241. 

'Great  Schism,' 281. 

Greece,  conquest  by  Macedonia, 
74 ;  freed  from  Macedonian 
rule  by  Rome,  124;  league 
of  smaller  states,  84;  Pelo- 
ponnesian  war  in,  60-68  ; 
Persian  wars,  32,  38 ;  Punic 
wars,  57 ;  Roman  conquest  of. 
84,  111,  126 ;  wars  with  the 
Turks,  494. 

Greek  Church,  the,  193. 

Greek  colonies,  31,  32,  55. 

Gregory  ix..  Pope,  248,  249. 
280. 

Gregory,  Saint,  169,  170,  185. 

Grey  Friars,  the,  263. 

Grindcob,  275. 

Guelfs  and  Ghibellines,  265. 

Guiscard,  Robert,  214. 

Gustavus  Adolphus,  363,  364. 

Gutenberg,  John,  298. 

Haarlem,  siege  of,  347. 
Hadrian's  Wall,  156,  164. 
Hamilcar,  51,  58,  113,  117. 
Hammurabi,  12. 
Hannibal  the  Great,  113,  114, 

118-122. 
Hanover,  union  with  Prussia, 

494. 
Harding,  Stephen,  231. 
Harold,    defeat    at    battle    of 

Hastings,  210. 
Hastings,  Warren,  418. 
Hawkins,  Sir  John,  356,  372. 
Hebrews,  the,  21. 
Heloi'se  and  Abelard,  234. 
Henry  i.  of  England,  239. 
Henry  ii.  of  England,  quarrel 

with  Thomas  Becket,  239. 
Henry  in.  of  England,  255,  256. 
Henry  iv.,  Emperor,  and  Pope 

Hildebrand,  212-216. 
Henry  iv.  of  England,  283,  284. 
Henry  v.  of  England,  283-285. 
Henry  vi.  of  England,  285,  289, 
Henry  vii.  of  England,  290. 
Henry  vin.    of  England,   324, 

325,  326,  327. 
Henry  of  Navarre,  Prince,  after- 
wards Henry  iv.  of  France, 

336,  337. 
Henry  of  Portugal,  Prince,  303, 

305,  306. 
Herculaneum,    destruction    of, 

160. 
Hildebrand,  Pope,  209-216. 
Himera,  battle  of,  58,  113. 
Hiram,  King  of  Tyre,  24,  25. 
Hofer,  Andrew,  the  Tyrolean 

peasant,  485. 
Hohenlinden,  battle  of,  475. 


544 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


Holland,  after  Napoleon's  wars, 

491 ;    colonies    in    America, 

379 ;  rise    of    the    Republic, 

377  ;  ^ar  with  England,  377 ; 

wars  with  Spain,  349. 
Holy  Eoman  Empire,  197,  199. 
Honorius,  Emperor  of  the  West, 

173. 
Honorius  in..  Pope,  248. 
Horatius,  story  of,  94. 
Hospitallers,  Knights,  222. 
Hudson  Bay  Company,  433. 
Huguenots,    massacre    on    St. 

Bartholomew's  Eve,  336,  337  ; 

persecutions  under  Louis  xiv. , 

383,  384,  385. 
Hundred  Years'  War,  269,  283- 

291. 
Hungary,  kingdom  established, 

206  ;    war  for  independence 

against  Austria,  496. 
Hunjadi,  John,  294. 
Huns,  the,  168,  175. 
Huss,  John,  282. 

Incas  or  Peru,  355. 

India,  409-421 ;  Alexander  the 
Great  in,  82;  Mutiny  in, 
419 ;  Portuguese  in,  307,  309 ; 
wars  between  French  and 
English  colonists  in,  399,  412- 
419. 

Innocent  in..  Pope,  258,  259; 
encouragement  of  crusades, 
245,  247 ;  excommunication 
of  Philip  Augustus,  244 ; 
quarrel  with  King  John  of 
England,  242  ;  war  with  Em- 
peror Frederick  ii. ,  250. 

Inquisition,  the,  344. 

Ireland,  538. 

Isaac,  15. 

Ishmael,  15. 

Ismail,  ruler  of  Egj'pt,  514,  515. 

Israelites,  the,  21,  23,  25. 

Issus,  battle  of,  79. 

Italians,  138. 

Italy,  city  states  of,  292 ;  union 
under  Victor  Emmanuel,  502. 

Jackson,  '  Stonewall,'  444. 

Jacob,  17,  18,  19,  21. 

Jacobins,  465. 

Jacquerie,  the,  276. 

James  i.  of  England,  372,  373. 

James  ii.  of  England,  362,  366, 
385,  389, 

Jameson,  Dr.,  524. 

Jansenists,  391. 

Japan,  story  of,  528 ;  war  with 
China,  531 ;  war  with  Russia, 
532. 

Java,  2. 

Jena,  battle  of,  480,  484. 

Jerome,  Saint,  171,  172. 

Jerusalem,  conquest  by  Seljuk 
Turks,  217  ;  regained  by  Cru- 
saders, 220 ;  retaken  by  Mo- 


hammedans,  255;    siege  of, 

160. 
Jesuits,  340. 

Jesus  Christ,  birth  of,  157. 
Jews,  the,  11,  22,  23,  25 ;  cap- 
tivity in  Babylon,    25,    26 ; 

dispersal  after  destruction  of 

Jerusalem,  160. 
Joan  of  Arc,  285-289. 
John  Chrysostom,  Saint,  172. 
John,  King  of  England,  241-242. 
Joseph,  story  of,  18, 19. 
Josephine,  Empiess,  469,   475, 

485,  490. 
Judah  and  Benjamin,  tribes  of, 

25. 
Jugurtha,    King    of    Numidia, 

136. 
Julian  the  Apostate,  169. 
Julius  Caesar,  135,  141-151. 
Justinian,    Emperor,    book    of 

Roman  Laws  by,  183 ;  Italy 

regained  for  Eastern  Empire 

by,  181-182. 

Kaaba,  the,  189. 

Kelly,   Ned,    the    bushranger, 

451. 
Khan,  the  Great,  261,  303. 
Khartum,  siege  of,  517. 
Kitchener,  Lord,  517,  525. 
Knights  of  the  Middle  Ages, 

204,  205. 
Knights'  War,  the,  323. 
Knox,  John,  333,  334. 
Koran,  the,  189. 
Korea,  531. 
Kosciusko,  408. 
Kossuth,  Louis,  495,  496. 
Kruger,  President,  524,  525. 

Lacedjemonians,  78. 

Lafayette,  Marquis  of,  457, 
460,  461. 

La  Fontaine,  fables  of,  382. 

Lake-dwellers,  the,  7. 

Lanfranc,  210,  237. 

Langton,  Stephen,  242. 

La  Rochelle,  siege  of,  383,  384. 

Lars  Porsena,  94,  96,  97. 

Latins,  the,  88,  105. 

Laud,  Archbishop  of  Canter- 
bury, 366,  367. 

La  Vendee,  rebellion  in,  465. 

La  Verendrye,  427. 

Lavinium,  88. 

Leipzig,  battle  of,  487. 

Leo,  the  Iconoclast,  191. 

Leonidas,  King  of  Sparta,  40. 

Leopold,  Duke  of  Austria, 
Richard  i.  imprisoned  by, 
226. 

Leopold  I.,  Emperor,  393,  394. 

Leopold  II. ,  Emperor,  462. 

Lepanto,  battle  of,  393. 

Leuctra,  battle  of,  71. 

Lewis  the  Pious,  198,  199. 

Leyden,  siege  of,  347. 


{  Liberia,  Republic  of,  509. 
Libj'ans,  the,  57,  58. 
Lincoln,  Abraham,  443,  445. 
Livingstone,  David,  519-521. 
Lollards,  the,  276. 
Lombard  League,  the,  223. 
Lombards,  the,  182  ;   conquest 

by  Charles  the  Great,    195  ; 

defeated  by  Pepin,  King  of 

the  Franks,  193. 
Lorenzo  the  Magnificent,  297. 
Lot,  13,  14. 
Louis  VII.  of  France,  crusade 

of,  222. 
Louis,     St.,     IX.     of     France, 

cru.sades  of,  352-354. 
Louis  XI.  of  France,  291. 
Louis  XIV.,  381-392;  persecution 

of  Protestants  by,  384,  385 ; 

persecution    of     Jansenists, 

391 ;  revocation  of  Edict  of 

Nantes,  383,  384;  seizure  of 

Spanish    Netherlands,    386 ; 

Triple  Alliance  against,  387  ; 

wars  of,  386. 
Louis  XVI.   457,  458,  460,  461, 

462  ;  execution  of,  464. 
Louis    XVIII.    478,     487,     488; 

France  under,  492. 
Louis  Napoleon.    See  Napoleon 

III. 
Louis  Philippe,  493. 
Low     Countries,     wars     with 

Spain,  343,  344. 
Loyola,  St.  Ignatius,  340,  341. 
Luceria,  battle  of,  107,  108. 
Luther,  Martin,  318. 

Macedonia,  73,  84. 

Magellan,       the       Portuguese 

explorer,  454. 
Magyars,  the,  203,  206. 
Mahdi,  the,  rising  of,  516,  517. 
Man,  coming  of,  1-9. 
Manfred,  250,  251. 
Mantinea,  battle  of,  72. 
Maoris,  the,  454,  455. 
Marat,  464,  466. 
Marathon,  battle  of,  35. 
Marcel,  Etienne,  277. 
Marcus  Aurelius,  163. 
Mardonius,  44. 
Marengo,  battle  of,  475. 
Margaret,    Spanish    regent    in 

Netherlands,  344,  345. 
Maria  Theresa,  and  war  of  the 

Austrian     Succession,      401, 

403 ;    part  in    Seven   Years' 

War,  405 ;  share  in  partition 

of  Poland,  407. 
Marie    Antoinette,     457,    458, 

460,  464,  465. 
Marius,  Caius,  135-139. 
Marlborough,  Duke  of,  390. 
Marsden,  Samuel,  454. 
Blarsilia,  56. 
Mary,  Queen  of  England,  331, 

350. 


INDEX 


545 


Mary  Queen  of  Scots,  332,  357. 
Maryland,  colony  of,  377. 
Masistios,  44. 
Massachusetts,  colonisation  of, 

376. 
Matilda,    wars    with    Stephen, 

239. 
Maximilian,  Emperor,  291. 
Mazarin,  Cardinal,  381,  382. 
Mazzini,  Joseph,  502. 
Mecca,  188,  189. 
Medici  family  of  Florence,  292. 
Medici,  Catherine  de',  335. 
Medici,  Cosmo  de',  295, 296,  297. 
Medici,  Lorenzo  de',  the  Magni- 
ficent, 297. 
Mehemet  Ali,  514. 
Melchisedech,  15. 
Melos,  rebellion  in,  64. 
Mesolonghi,  siege  of,  495. 
Mesopotamia,  10. 
Messana,  war  between  Romans 

and  Carthaginians  in,  115. 
Mexico,    conquest    by    Cortes, 

354.  '         ^  •^ 

Michael  Angelo,  296,  297,  325. 
Michelozzo,  295. 
Middle  Ages,  179-279. 
Milan,  state  of,  252. 
Miletus,       rebellion        against 

Persian  rule,  34,  35. 
Milner,  Sir  Alfred,  524. 
Miltiades,  36,  37. 
Milton,  John,  370. 
Mithridates,    the    Great,    138, 

143,  144, 
Mogul,  the  Great,  410. 
Mohammed,  188. 
Mohammed  ii..  Sultan,  taking 

of   Constantinople    by,   294, 

295. 
Mohammedanism,     beginnings 

of,  188-194. 
Monasteries,  184. 
Mongol  conquest  of  India,  410. 
Monks    in    England,    237 ;    in 

time  of  crusades,  229. 
Montcalm,  General,   429,   430, 

431. 
Monteziima,  King,  355. 
Montfort,  Simon  de,  256. 
Montreal,  founded  by  Champ- 
lain,  425. 
Moore,  Sir  John,  483. 
Moors  in  Africa,  the,  510  ;    in 

Spain,  192,  227,  311. 
More,    Sir    Thomas,    316,    327, 

329,  330,  339. 
Morocco,  510,  511. 
Moses,  story  of,  21. 
Mycale,  battle  of,  45. 

Naples,  kingdom  of,  473,  479, 

491. 
Napoleon  Bonaparte,  story  of, 

467,  468-490. 
Napoleon    iii.    Emperor,    493, 

494,  496,  500,  501,  503. 


Natal,  307,  522. 

Navarino,  battle  of,  495. 

Neander  men,  4. 

Nebuchadnezzar,  26. 

Negro  men,  the,  6,  7. 

Nelson,  Lord,  470,  471,  472, 
476,  478. 

Nero,  Emperor,  158-160. 

Netherlands,  Protestants  strug- 
gle against  Spanish  rule  in, 
343,  344  ;  seizure  by  Louis 
XIV.,  386. 

New  Amsterdam,  379. 

New  York,  379,  441,  444. 

New  Zealand,  448,  454,  455. 

Newspapers,  536. 

Ney,  Marshal,  492. 

Nicasa,  Council  of,  169. 

Nicholas  I.,  Pope,  206. 

Nicholas  v..  Pope,  297,  298. 

Nicholas  Breakspear,  after- 
wards Pope  Adrian  iv. ,  223. 

Nicias,  65,  66. 

Nightingale,  Florence,  498. 

Nile,  battle  of  the,  471. 

Norman  Conquest,  the,  203, 
209. 

North  America,  colonisation  of, 
379 ;  wars  between  French 
and  English  in,  399. 

Northmen,  the,  196,  200-208. 

Numidia,  King  of,  127 ;  Marius' 
conquest  of,  136. 

OcTAvius,  afterwards  Emperor 

Augustus  Ccesar,  152,  154. 
Odoacer,  179,  180. 
d'Higgins,  506. 
Olympic  Games,  29. 
Omdurman,  battle  of,  517. 
Ontario,  432. 
Opium  War,  531. 
Orange  Free  State,  522,  525. 
Order  of  the  Garter,  272,  273. 
Orleans,  siege  of,  286,  287. 
Otto,  Emperor,  206,  207. 
Ottoman  Turks,  the,  294. 
Oxford,  University  of,  263. 

Papal  States,  194  ;  union  with 

Italy,  504,  505. 
Papineaii,  Louis,  432. 
Paris,  siege  of,  501. 
Park,  Llungo,  518. 
Parliament,  the   English,    365, 

369. 
Parthenon,  the,  50. 
Patricians,  90. 
Patrick,  Saint,  196. 
Paul,  St.,  32,  131, 157, 159, 160. 
Pausanias,  46. 
Peasants'   Revolt   in   England, 

273,  274,  275 ;  in  France,  276. 
Peloponnesia,  39. 
Peloponnesian  War,  54,  60-68. 
Penda  of  Mercia,  186. 
Penn,  William,  379. 
Pennsylvania,  379. 

2  M 


Penny  Post,  the,  534. 

Pepin,  King,  193. 

Pericles,  49,  54,  61,  62,  63. 

Perseus,  125,  126. 

Persia  conquered  by  Alexander 
the  Great,  77. 

Persians,  the,  27,  32  ;  wars 
with  Greece,  38. 

Peru,  conquest  by  Pizarro,  355. 

Peter  de  Bruys,  232. 

Peter  the  Great,  395-398. 

Peter  the  Hermit,  218,  219. 

Peter,  Saint,  160. 

Peter  Waldez,  233. 

Petrarch,  277,  279. 

Phalaris,  56. 

Phidias,  50,  51. 

Philip  I.  and  St.  Bruno,  230. 

Philip  II.  of  Spain,  343,  357. 

Philip  II.  of  Macedon,  73-75. 

Philip  V.  of  Macedon,  123-125. 

Philip  Augustus,  222,  244, 
252. 

Philip  the  Fair  of  France  and 
Pope  Boniface,  269. 

Philippine  Islands,  discovery 
of,  354. 

Phoenicians,  the,  24. 

Pilgrim  Fathers,  371,  376. 

Pitt,  William,  Lord  Chatham, 
405,  417,  435,  440. 

Pitt,  William,  the  younger,  476, 
477,  480. 

Pizarro,  conquest  of  Peru  by, 
355. 

Plassey,  battle  of,  417. 

Plat^a,  battle  of,  45 ;  destruc- 
tion by  Spartans,  13  ;  siege 
by  Thebans,  61. 

Plebeians,  the,  90. 

Pocahontas,  375. 

Poland,  establishment  of  king- 
dom, 206 ;  partition  of,  406. 

Polo,  Marco,  303. 

Pompeii,  destruction  of,  160. 

Pompey,  142-148. 

Poor  Law,  the  first,  374. 

Popes,  the,  166,  193,  206;  at 
Avignon,  268,  269 ;  Council 
of  Constance  to  decide  the 
Great  Schism,  281  ;  return 
to  Rome,  279,  280  ;  struggles 
with  the  Holy  Roman  Em- 
perors, 197,  212,  265. 

Portuguese  in  Africa,  305,  306  ; 
in  China  and  Japan,  528,  529  ; 
in  India,  307,  309,  412. 

Porus,  King,  82. 

Potiphar,  King,  18,  19. 

Pragmatic  Sanction,  401,  403. 

Pretender,  the  Old,  390. 

Pretender,  the  Young,  390. 

Printing,  invention  of,  298. 

Protestants,  the,  in  England 
and  Scotland,  318,  330,  332, 
366,  370 ;  in  France,  336,  383  ; 
in  Germany,  318  ;  in  Nether- 
lands, 343,  344. 


546 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  WORLD 


Prussia,  war  with  France,  500, 

501. 
Punic  Wars,  117-128, 
Puritans,    the,   332,    366,   369, 

370,  371. 
Pyramids  of  Egypt,  101. 
Pyrrhus,     campaigns     against 

Romans,  112,  113. 
Pythagoras,  55. 

Quebec,  founded  by  Champlain, 
425 ;  taking  of,  429. 

Rachel,  18. 

Raglan,  Lord,  497. 

Railways,  534,  535. 

Raleigh,  Sir  Walter,  352,  371- 
373. 

Rebecca,  17. 

Reformation,  the,  315-338 ; 
counter  movement  against, 
339. 

Regulus,  117. 

Reign  of  Terror,  465. 

Reindeer  men,  4. 

Renaissance,  the,  293  ;  great 
kings  of,  324. 

Rhodes,  Cecil,  ideal  of,  523. 

Richard  of  the  Lion  Heart, 
crusade  of,  222-227  ;  im- 
prisonment by  Duke  Leopold 
of  Austria,  226. 

Richard  ii.  of  England,  273, 
283,  284. 

Richelieu,  Cardinal,  364,  381, 
382 ;  siege  of  La  Rochelle  by, 
384. 

Riel,  Louis,  433. 

Rienzi,  279. 

Robert,  Duke  of  Normandj-,  on 
crusade,  219,  220. 

Roberts,  Lord,  525. 

Robespierre,  466. 

Rodney,  Admiral,  440. 

Roger  II.,  King  of  Naples  and 
Sicily,  215. 

Roland,  story  of,  195,  196. 

Rolf  the  Ranger,  201. 

Roman  triumphs,  125. 

Rome,  barbarian  invasions  of, 
164,  165, 166-168 ;  burning  of 
city  by  Celts,  100 ;  burning 
of  city  by  Normans,  215 ; 
Christianity  accepted  by,  165, 
168  ;  citizenship  of,  131  ; 
classes  in,  90 ;  colonies  of, 
100, 108 ;  conquest  of  Britain, 
155 ;  conquest  of  Gaul,  128 ; 
conquest  of  Greece,  111,  115, 
116,  123,  126;  conquest  of 
Macedonia,  125 ;  conquest  of 
Spain,  120,  168 ;  early  days 
of  the  Empire,  152-165  ; 
Eastern  Empire  of,  123-128, 
144  ;  Etruscan  wars,  93,  96 ; 
founding  of,  89 ;  government 
of,  90,  91 ;  last  days  of  the 
Republic,    129;    mistress    of 


Italy,  100-110 ;  navy  of,  115, 
118 ;  rise  of,  85-95 ;  sack  of 
city  by  Alaric,  173 ;  sack 
of  city  by  Genseric,  177 ; 
siege  by  Charles  v.,  525  ;  Veii 
taken  by,  97  ;  wars  with  Car- 
thage, 115-122  ;  wars  with 
Samnites,  105,  106. 

Rome,  King  of,  485,  493. 

Romulus  and  Remus,  88. 

Romulus  Augustulus,  177,  178. 

Roses,  Wars  of  the,  289. 

Rubens,  377. 

Russia,  constitution  of,  505, 
part  in  Crimean  War,  496, 
497 ;  under  Peter  the  Great 
395. 

Russian  Church,  193,  206. 

Russo-Japanese  War,  532. 

Ruyter,  Admiral,  378. 

Sabines,  the,  90. 

Saint  Bartholomew's  Eve,  mas- 
sacre of,  337. 

St.  Petersburg,  396. 

Saints  and  mart}'rs,  early,  163. 

Saladin,  222,  224,  225,  226,  511, 
512. 

Salamis,  battle  of,  42. 

Samaritans,  the,  25. 

Samnites,  the,  88 ;  conquest  of 
Campania  by,  104,  105 ; 
Roman  wars  with,  105,  106. 

San  Martin,  506. 

Saracens,  the,  191,  195. 

Saragossa,  siege  of,  482. 

Saul,  23. 

Schleswig-Holstein  surrendered 
to  Prussia,  500. 

Scotland,  Puritans'  rebellion  in, 
367;  war  of  independence,  256. 

Sebastopol,  siege  of,  498. 

Sedan,  battle  of,  500. 

Seljuk  Turks,  217. 

Semitic  peoples,  the,  11. 

Seven  Years'  War,  405. 

Shakespeare,  William,  350. 

Siberia,  505. 

Sicilian  vespers,  251. 

Sicily,  Athenian  expedition 
under  Alcibiades  to,  64  ; 
Hamilcar's  expeditionagainst, 
57  ;  Roman  conquest  of,  43  ; 
under  Charles  of  Anjou,  250, 
251 

Sidney,  Sir  Philip,  351. 

Si^y^s,  Abb^,  473. 

Sigismund,  Emperor,  281,  282. 

Simeon  Stylites,  Saint,  172. 

Siraj-ud-Daula  and  Black  Hole 
of  Calcutta,  416. 

Skull  of  the  first  man,  2. 

Slavery,  abolition  of,  442 ;  com- 
menced by  John  Hawkins, 
356. 

Slavonic  race,  167. 

Smith,  John,  the  first  English 
colonist,  375. 


Smith,  Sir  Sidney,  472. 

Sobieski,  John,  393. 

Society  of  Jesus,  341,  342. 

Socrates,  52-54. 

Solomon,  King,  23-25. 

Sophocles,  51. 

South  Africa,  union  of,  525. 

South  America,  Spanish  con- 
quests in,  353,  354,  506. 

Spain,  Moors  in,  191,  192,  227 ; 
Roman  conquest  of,  120, 128  ; 
war  with  England,  352 ;  war 
with  the  Netherlands,  342- 
349. 

Spanish  Armada,  defeat  of, 
358. 

Spanish  Netherlands,  seizure 
by  Louis  xiv. ,  386. 

Spanish  Succession,  War  of, 
388. 

Sparta,  30,  31  ;  jealousy  of 
Athens,  46  ;  conquest  of 
Athens  by,  67;  Peloponnesian 
war,  54,  60. 

Spartacus,  leader  of  the  Gladi- 
ators, 143. 

Spartans,  the,  31,  40,  42,  45. 

Spenser,  Edmund,  351. 

Stanley,  Henry  Morton,  521. 

Steamship,  invention  of,  535. 

Stein,  the  Prussian  statesman, 
484. 

Stephen,  King,  wars  with 
Matilda,  239. 

Stilicho,  173. 

Stone  Age,  7. 

Stonehenge,  7. 

Straw.  Jack,  275. 

Suez  Canal,  514. 

Sulla,  Lucius  Cornelius,  135- 
137,  138,  139,  140,  141. 

Suvarov,  General,  473. 

Switzerland,  Helvetian  Re- 
public established,  472. 

Sybaris,  55. 

Sydney,  New  South  Wales, 
449,  450. 

Syracuse,  battle  of,  66. 

Tancred,  231. 

Tarentum,  55 ;  battle  of,  112. 

Tarquin  kings  of  Rome,  92, 
93. 

Tasmania,  446. 

Telegraph  and  telephone,  elec- 
tric 535. 

Templars,  the,  221. 

Temple  at  Jerusalem,  24. 

Ten  Commandments,  the,  22. 

Tetzel,  John,  319. 

Teutons,  the,  167. 

Thebans,  siege  of  Plataea  by, 
61. 

Thebes,  rise  of,  69,  71. 

Themistocles,  37,  39,  42. 

Theodore  of  Tarsus,  187. 

Theodoric,  King  of  the  Ostro- 
goths, 180,  181. 


INDEX 


547 


Theodosius,  170,  173. 

Thermopylae,  story  of,  39. 

Thirty  Years'  War,  362. 

Thomas    Aquinas,    Saint,   263, 
264,  267. 

Tilsit,  Peace  of,  480. 

Titus,  siege  of  Jerusalem  b}', 
160. 

Torres,  de,  446. 

Toulouse,  174. 

Trajan,  Emperor,  163. 

Transvaal,  Boers  in,  522,  524. 

Trent,  Council  of,  342. 

Tribes,  primitive,  8. 

Tribunes  of  the  people,  132. 

Trifanum,  battle  of,  105. 

Triple  Alliance  against   Louis 
XIV.,  387. 

Tromp,  Admiral,  378. 

Tudor  kings,  the,  290,  365. 

Tunis,  510,  511. 

Turenne,  General,  386. 

Turks,    conquest    of     Algeria, 
Tunis,  and  Tripoli,  510 ;  Con- 
stantinople  taken    by,   294 
Grecian   wars    against,    494 
part  in  Crimean  War,  497 
siege    of    Vienna    by,    393 
struggle    of  Balkan    nations 
against,  498. 

Tyler,  Wat,  273. 

Tyndale,  327. 

Tyre,  siege  of,  80. 

Ulm,  battle  of,  478. 
Umbrians,  the,  88. 
Unitarians,  the,  400. 


United  States  of  America,  Civil 
War  in,  443  ;  formation  of, 
441. 

Universities,  founding  of,  263. 

Urban  ii..  Pope,  217,  218. 

Urban  v..  Pope,  279. 

Valentinian,    Emperor,     176, 

177. 
Vandals,  the,  167,  174 ;  North 

African  kingdom  founded  by, 

174. 
Veii,  siege  of,  96. 
Vendee,  La,  rebellion  in,  465. 
Venezuela,  506. 
Venice,  state  of,  176,  252,  254, 

256 ;  decline  of,  308. 
Vercengetorix,  145. 
Versailles,  382. 
Vespucci,  Amerigo,  352. 
Vestal  Virgins,  the,  91. 
Victor  Emmanuel,  King,  503, 

504. 
Vienna,  siege  by  Turks,   393, 

394. 
Vikings,  the,  196. 
Virginia,   colonisation  of,   372, 

373,  375. 
Visigoths,  in  Gaul,  183, 184;  in 

Spain,  191 ;  invasion  of  Italy 

by,   173  ;    kingdom  founded 

in  South-West  Europe,  174. 

Waoram,  battle  of,  485. 
Wales,  conquest  of,  256. 
Wallace,  William,  256. 
Wallenstein,  363,  364. 


Walter  the  Penniless,  219. 
Washington,   George,   427-429, 

438. 
Waterloo,  battle  of,  489. 
Wellington,  Duke  of,  482,  489. 
West  Indies,  discovery  of,  313. 
Westphalia,  Treaty  of,  265. 
'  White  Ship,'  wreck  of,  238. 
'White  Terror,'  the,  492. 
William  i..   Emperor   of  Ger- 
many, 499,  502. 
William    of  Champeaux,    233, 

234. 
William    the   Conqueror,   203, 

209,  214. 
William  of  Orange,  the  Silent, 

346-349, 
William  of  Orange,  afterwards 

William  iii.   of  England,   3, 

85,  388,  390. 
William  Rufus,  237. 
Wireless  telegraphy,  535. 
Wolfe,  General,  429-431. 
Wolseley,  Lord,  433. 
Wolsey,  Cardinal,  329. 
WycliflF,   John,   275,  276,  277, 

281. 

Xavieb,  St.  Francis,  341. 
Xenophon's   great    march,   69, 

70. 
Xerxes,  King,  38,  43. 

Zama,  battle  of,  120, 
Zambesi  River,  the,  307,  520. 
Zizka,  John,  283. 
Zulu  Wars,  522. 


Printed  by  T.  and  A.  Constable,  Printers  to  His  Majesty 
at  the  Edinburgh  University  Press 


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